One or two sets of ears were waving slowly in tentative half agreement with him now, but Jainfar’s ears frowned, instead.
“I agree those are interesting possibilities, Sir,” the blunt old space dog said. “Yet it sounds very much to me as if you are suggesting that it was the Kreptu—or someone—and not the humans who attacked Ground Base Seven. That would require them to act far more directly, and get far more blood on their claws, than they’ve ever done before.”
“Unless they’re actively cooperating with the humans on the ground, Squadron Commander,” Ground Base Commander Barak said thoughtfully. “Providing the humans with technological support to get them through our defenses, then standing back and allowing the humans to do the actual bloodletting.”
Thikair looked at him, and the ground base commander shrugged.
“I’m not saying that’s the case, you understand, Sir. But consider this. If we do, indeed, have a significant enemy within the Hegemony who’s finally awakened to the Empire’s long-term plans—whether the Kreptu or one of the weed-eaters, like the Liatu—they might be seeking more than one quarry in a single hunt. Embarrass and discredit us, yes. Perhaps even attempt to build some countervailing military power or faction within the Hegemony. But suppose they also see this as an opportunity to more directly evaluate our own military capabilities in order to decide how dangerous we truly are? Is it not possible that, in such an instance, they might provide the humans with assistance against us? Especially if they believed that seeing how we responded to the enhanced threat might tell them a great deal about our capabilities. For that matter, might it not be possible they would use our automatic assumption that it must be humans who attacked Ground Base Seven as cover for an incursion of their own personnel, whereby our systems and their capabilities might be directly evaluated and tested?”
“I can’t see the Liatu getting that close to so much bloodletting,” Jainfar replied. “They’re almost as squeamish as the Barthoni. The Kreptu, now . . . I might see them in that role. Or the Garm or the Howsanth, for that matter.”
“I realize I’m the one who initially started us down this scent,” Thikair said. “I think we’ve wandered about as far in speculation as we profitably can at this point, however. All we truly know at this stage is that Ground Base Seven has been attacked and that the attack clearly exceeds the capability of anything we’ve previously seen out of the humans. Beyond that, all we can do is wander through the realms of hypothesis, which seems unlikely to lead us to any hard and fast conclusions. For that, we will require additional information—more evidence.”
His subordinates all looked at him, and he bared his canines in a frosty challenge smile.
“Don’t misunderstand me. I’m as . . . anxious about this as anyone. But let’s look at it. We’ve been hurt—badly—and as yet we actually know very little about how it was done. One thing is crystal clear, however: whatever happened, it took Shairez’s entire base completely by surprise. The first step, then, is to see to it that no one can surprise us a second time. Whether this represents the use of some previously unknown human capability or the work of another member of the Hegemony is immaterial in that regard.”
He turned his attention to Ground Force Commander Thairys.
“If, indeed, this is someone seeking to evaluate our technology, obviously we should take the opportunity to evaluate their technology, in return. As good as Ground Base Seven’s security systems were, none of them were specifically directed at Hegemony-level threats, so it’s distinctly possible we left ourselves vulnerable to a more sophisticated incursion. I believe our first step, then, should be to completely reassess our systems’ vulnerabilities. Improving our existing capabilities can’t possibly hurt anything against the humans, and if in fact one of our fellow members of the Hegemony is playing games with us, a sufficient upgrade of our systems may just come as an unpleasant surprise for them.
“So we start by putting all of our bases and personnel on maximum alert. Next, we emphasize to all of our personnel that whoever was responsible may have some form of stealth technology. They won’t like hearing that, but it will at least begin putting events into a familiar frame of reference, and that can’t hurt. Better they be concentrating on a threat which fits into their existing . . . mental landscapes, as Shairez might have put it, than spending their time fueling the rumor mill with all manner of wild speculation!
“Next, since we apparently can’t rely on our sensors until we’ve upgraded them suitably, we’ll put our own physical senses online. When I say I want maximum alertness, I mean precisely that. I want all of our ground bases to integrate every unit assigned to them into real-time, free-flow communications nets. All checkpoints will be manned, not left to the automatics. Regular roving patrols and additional fixed, manned security points will be established, and all detachments will check in regularly with their central HQs. At the same time as we announce those measures to all personnel, I want all officers above the rank of battalion commander informed we may be looking at covert operations by enemies within the Hegemony. I want them ready to recognize that if they see evidence of it, and to respond decisively. If in fact we have . . . rivals creeping about in our backyard, I want them identified and neutralized. I’d prefer that they be taken alive and fully interrogated, but at this particular moment, I’m not feeling too particular about that, either.” He bared his canines again, briefly. “For that matter, even a dead Kreptu or two would make a fairly convincing bit of evidence if it becomes necessary to demonstrate their manipulation of the situation to the Council.”
“And if it isn’t another member of the Hegemony, Sir?” Thairys asked quietly. “If it turns out the humans did somehow breach Ground Base Commander Shairez’s security without outside assistance?”
“To be honest, in many ways, I’d be relieved to have that proved,” Thikair admitted. “It would be much less alarming in terms of the Empire’s long-term strategy than discovering that our intended prey has become aware we intend to stalk it in the fullness of time. And if it turns out this was, indeed, simply another example of the humans having applied their more primitive technology more innovatively than we’d anticipated or allowed for, improvements in our own sensors’ sophistication are bound to catch them at it in the end. Ultimately, our capabilities are simply too much greater than theirs, even if we haven’t yet applied them sufficiently to the problem, for any other outcome.
“In the short term, however, while we’re reassessing and improving our systems’ capabilities, our hardware will remain vulnerable to similar penetrations by whoever managed this one, which is why I want such special emphasis placed on manned surveillance during our reassessment. For that matter, I have greater ultimate faith in the senses and alertness of our own people—of sentries aware of their responsibilities and concentrating upon them—than I do in any automated systems, however capable. Even if our sensors can’t detect these people—whoever they are—on their way in, we can at least be certain our own eyes, ears, and noses will tell us when they’ve arrived.”
He looked around the table again.
“Our warriors, our officers, are Shongairi. We will not allow this episode to stampede us like a weed-eater fleeing the hunter! With duties to concentrate upon, our troopers will settle down despite the rumors, and looked at from a proper perspective our other ground bases actually become bait. Our people are predators—hunters—and the canny hunter shapes his method to the prey he seeks. For the hasthar, the spear, the coursing beast, and the horn. For the garish, the snare. For the binarch, the concealed pit and beaters to drive him into it. For the great tharntar, the staked-out mahrlar, as bait. And for taking the most dangerous or elusive prey of all, the hunter’s greatest weapon is often patience. Very well, we will be patient, but we will also remember that sooner or later the time always—always—comes for the hunter to pounce. And pounce we shall, when that moment arrives. Whatever human trick this may be, whatever advanced stealth another member of the Heg
emony may be able to bring to bear, we will find a way to detect it. Have no fear of that. And once detected, we will track it down and kill it!”
• • • • •
“Yes, Thairys?” Thikair said.
The ground force commander had lingered as the other senior officers filed out. Now he looked at the fleet commander, his ears half folded, and his eyes were somber.
“There were two small points I . . . chose not to mention in front of the others, Sir,” he said quietly.
“Oh?” Thikair managed to keep his voice level, despite the sudden cold tingle dancing down his nerves.
“Yes, Sir. First, I’m afraid the preliminary medical exams indicate that Ground Base Commander Shairez was killed at least two day-twelfths after the rest of her personnel. And there are indications that she was . . . interrogated for quite some time before her neck was broken.”
“I see.” Thikair looked at his subordinate for a moment, then cleared his throat. “Two points, I believe you said?”
“Yes, Sir. I did. And the second point is that all of the base’s neural education units are missing, Sir.”
He met Thikair’s eyes, and the fleet commander drew a deep breath of comprehension.
“I think there’s considerable merit to the points you raised about possible involvement by other members of the Hegemony, Sir,” Thairys continued quietly. “I don’t know if your concerns are justified, but I do know all of us are groping for clues at this point. Obviously, until we know more the possibilities are endless. Nonetheless, I must admit that the loss of those education units . . . concerns me. Deeply. I find myself wondering if any other member of the Hegemony could be so completely mad, so insane, as to have simply handed such devices to a species like the humans. On the other hand, if not to hand them to the humans, why take them at all? Their utility to any other of the advanced races would be negligible, as they already possess educator technology of their own, but Ground Base Commander Shairez had determined that humans were neurally educable even without implants. Indeed, that was why the units were present in her base in such numbers. And that’s why their absence concerns me so deeply. If they’ve fallen into human hands—whether they were initially seized by the humans themselves or simply given to them by someone else—and if the humans know how to operate them. . . .”
The ground commander’s voice trailed off. There was, after all, no need for him to complete the sentence, since each of the education units contained the basic knowledge platform of the entire Hegemony.
. XXXVII .
“Pieter, there’s someone looking for you.”
Ushakov looked up, eyebrows arching in surprise.
“Looking for me?” he repeated, and Ivan Kolesnikov shrugged.
There was something a bit peculiar about that shrug, Ushakov thought, although this was scarcely the first time someone had come seeking them. They’d lost Fyodor Belov four days ago, and even counting Ushakov and Kolesnikov, there were only seven of his original Ukrainians left. Yet despite those losses, his overall strength had actually increased, because they’d attracted a steady trickle of Russians, most of whom couldn’t have cared less whether their leader spoke Russian, Ukrainian, or Swahili. All they cared about was his ability as an alien-killer.
There were times when Ushakov suspected that the brutality the Shongairi had shown in his area of operations stemmed directly from the effectiveness of those operations. That was the way it usually worked when “partisans” or “guerrillas”—or “terrorists,” he supposed, since one man’s guerrilla was another man’s terrorist—proved successful. Whatever occupier they were attacking at the moment lashed out at the civilians in the area. In the process, a lot of civilians got killed . . . and a lot of survivors became guerrillas. And of course, the reverse was sometimes true. If he’d been willing to leave the Shongairi alone, they might have been willing to be less brutal to the Russians in the area.
They might.
But he wasn’t going to leave them alone, and most of the locals who’d managed to survive this far seemed to share his bitter, unwavering hatred for the aliens. They didn’t really care whether or not his operations were provoking reprisals, because almost all of them had joined his band because they no longer had anyone left for the Shongairi to retaliate against.
In the process, he’d become a marked man in the resistance, and he knew it. Even the Shongairi had identified him—by name, anyway—and the handful of Shongair prisoners Ushakov’s men had taken and interrogated had made it clear enough (before their own inevitable deaths) that their superiors wanted Pieter Ushakov’s head on a stick.
The thought didn’t exactly fill him with terror. Nothing did that anymore, he’d discovered. If anything, it pleased him as proof of how badly he’d hurt them. Still, he’d been careful to maintain operational security. If the Shongairi really wanted him, and if they were smart enough to figure it out, they’d be trying to capture one of his guerrillas who could lead them to him. Or the family member of one of his guerrillas, perhaps. Someone they could . . . convince or coerce into betraying him to them. And there was no point in pretending they couldn’t do that, if it occurred to them. Enough pain, enough starvation, or—far worse—enough threats to someone a human being loved—to a daughter or a son, a wife or a husband—would eventually find the chink in anyone’s armor.
Unless, of course, they’d already lost everyone they’d ever loved.
“Who is this ‘someone,’ Vanya?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” Kolesnikov said unhappily. “He just . . . turned up outside Fetyukov’s bunker.” The young lieutenant who no longer looked young shook his head. “I don’t like it,” he admitted.
“Is he looking for me, me, or is he looking for ‘the rebel commander’ me?”
“He asked for you by name.”
Kolesnikov didn’t seem to be getting any happier, and Ushakov didn’t blame him.
“Where is he now?”
“He says he’ll be back at Fetyukov’s in a couple of hours. He wants you to meet him there.”
“Don’t go, Pieter! Please!” a voice said, and Ushakov turned his head and looked at the child sitting on the other side of the table from him.
Her name was Zinaida, and she was seven years old. A heartbreakingly wise and frightened seven years old.
He reached out a hand, and she took it, squeezing his thumb in one small, tight fist and his little finger in the other. His Daria had held his hand that way, before she became “a big girl,” he remembered, and smiled at her.
“I’m not going anywhere right this minute,” he promised her in Russian.
“But you are going,” she said, tears welling in her blue eyes. “I know you are!”
“Perhaps I am,” he agreed, then cocked his head. “But if I do, what did you promise me?”
“That I’d let you,” she said in a tiny voice.
“Yes,” he agreed. “And that you would take care of your mother and Boris and Kondratii. That’s what big girls do.”
She nodded mutely, still staring up into his face through a blur of tears, and he felt the heart he’d thought had died in Kiev melt inside him.
Stupid, he thought again. Stupid! What in God’s name are you thinking, you lunatic? You’ve been on borrowed time for months now, and you know it.
Yes, he was, and he did. But when he looked into those eyes, he couldn’t help himself.
And so he had done the unforgivable. He’d let himself start feeling again, even if it was the worst thing he could possibly do.
His mind went back to the day they’d met, when Zinaida had clung to him so desperately while the explosion sealed the water main behind them. It turned out they had been deep enough to survive the kinetic bombardment which had turned the woods through which they’d run into a cratered, seared wasteland almost exactly on schedule. The “tunnel” had run far enough to get them safely out of the immediate area, as well, and he’d used the same tactic twice more since then. Of course, one c
ouldn’t always find a convenient water main when one needed one, but he and Kolesnikov had trained their Russian recruits into competent combat engineers in their own right. And along the way they’d taught them that there was nothing magic about kinetic bombardments. Explosions were explosions, and a deep enough hole far enough away from the point of impact was what made explosions survivable.
But what had changed for Pieter Ushakov on that day was the way in which the aching hole in his heart had suddenly found something to fill it. A frightened, half-starved little girl. Her younger brother, who never spoke anymore, except in whispers to their mother. Her baby brother, born after the Shongairi’s arrival. And the courageous young woman who had managed, against unimaginable odds, to keep both of her older children alive while she found enough sustenance, somehow, to produce the breast milk her baby needed.
Larissa Karpovna didn’t talk about that very much. In fact, she said little more than her son Boris, but she’d attached herself to Ushakov. It wasn’t a romantic attachment. He didn’t think he’d have another one of those—not like the one he’d had with Vladislava, at any rate. No man was blessed enough by God to have two loves like that. And he didn’t think Larissa really thought of him as a man—not in any sexual sense, at any rate. He was . . . he was her rock, he thought. He was the solidity she clung to, the only faint promise of safety for her children in a world gone far worse than simply insane.
He respected her deeply. In fact, he’d been a bit surprised when he realized just how much he did respect her and her accomplishment in preserving her children as long as she had. And he’d found that he did love her, but it was as if she were Zinaida’s older sister, not someone old enough, if barely, to have been his own wife. All four of them had somehow become his children, and that was a terrible thing, because it gave him something to live for.