Marque of Caine Read online

  Weber nodded, watched as Downing started the transfer. “Sir, because of the channels I monitor, I think I have an idea of what those requests might be.”

  Downing looked up, raised an eyebrow. “Then I’m sure you are also aware that any request that involves another organization—let us say, the State Department—should be allowed to move at a normal pace. To avoid detection.”

  Weber nodded. “Yes. But if my latest reports are accurate, that may not be a luxury that we—or Commodore Riordan—can afford.”

  Downing forgot about his datalink, looked full into Weber’s face. What have you heard, David? And why won’t you say it straight out? He spent an extra second waiting, hoping that continued scrutiny might wring another useful fact or two out of the big man.

  But Weber’s was a good face for playing poker, for keeping secrets. Many of which pertained to the mysterious combination of good fortune and sheer will he had used to rebuild his life after having a control frigate blasted out from under him at the Battle of Barnard’s Star in 2119. One of the most seasoned officers on station, he had been the deputy commander of the contingent of manned hulls that had remained behind to control the decoy ships.

  Not much more than armed frameworks, the decoys had engaged the Arat Kur fleet, ultimately convincing them that they had destroyed most of Earth’s force in being. However, because the decoys were uncrewed, they had required direction from control frigates. And since authentically swift reaction times required that the range between them remained under 150,000 kilometers, the much smaller frigates had come under fire from the Arat Kur equivalent of capital ships. They had been ruthlessly savaged.

  That Weber survived at all was a near miracle; he was one of only six from his own ship. That he was walking straight and tall and not merely performing but excelling at his tasks as leader of the Oversight Directorate of Interbloc Network Systems was in full defiance of the most optimistic clinical projections of his recovery.

  And yet, some part of him had not come back from beyond the farther orbits of Barnard’s Star: that part which used to laugh long and deep and was fond of puns that left entire wardrooms groaning. That part of David Weber was still MIA, out beyond the wreckage of his ship and the monomolecular remains of his crew.

  Weber’s return stare showed no sign of relenting. “Sir, any actions on Riordan’s behalf must be completed swiftly. And they will be impossible to conceal entirely.”

  Downing nodded. “I presumed that, Captain.” He glanced at Weber’s datalink. “Tell me, can it be done?”

  Weber was scanning the requests. “It has to be, sir. So, yes. Failure is not an option.”

  Those had been Weber’s last words before he went off-line at Barnard’s Star. “That’s something of a motto of yours, isn’t it, David?”

  Weber touched his eyepatch distractedly. He answered in a lower, slower voice. “There have been times I wish it wasn’t.” Then, as an afterthought: “Sir.”

  Downing would have liked to pat the poor fellow on what was said to be an entirely artificial knee, envisioned himself doing it: a wiry scarecrow tapping a gigantic partial-tin-man in a feeble gesture of solace. He decided against it. “That motto has come with a heavy cost,” Downing observed soberly.

  “Honor demanded no less, sir,” Weber replied. “We’ll get it done.”

  Downing nodded, looked out the window. The Reflecting Pool loomed up at them as they dropped toward the vertipad just behind the Lincoln Memorial. “I say, Weber, I’m wondering if you could by any chance initiate a scan for—”

  Weber was already looking up from his palmtop. “Riordan’s right there, sir. Near the Vietnam War Memorial.” As the door started to rise, he added, “Watch your step, Director.”

  Downing had the impression that Weber was not just referring to exiting the aircar.

  * * *

  Caine detected Downing’s approach more out of reflex and instinct than a conscious application of training. Riordan turned to face away from him, began walking slowly through the crowds lining the south side of the Reflecting Pool.

  Within half a minute, strolling slightly faster, Downing had caught up to him. They slowed in sync with each other, keeping two loud groups of tourists on either side of them.

  “I thought you were sequestered,” Caine said softly, not turning to look at Richard.

  “I am. But it’s the kinder variety. You can get out for a stroll now and again, enjoy the occasional conjugal visit.” Downing’s weak sputter of sardonic laughter sounded more weary than bitter.

  “I see. Well then, since meeting here isn’t wild coincidence, I don’t know whether I should be honored or worried.”

  Downing stared up at the sun, said casually, “You have to leave.”

  “I know. Just as soon as I’m able to—”

  “No, Caine. You can’t wait until you’re ‘able to.’”

  Riordan almost missed a step. “I’m not sure what that means.”

  “It means that if you hang about to dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s, you will be too late. You have to go now. Before the Interbloc Working Group can announce new hearings and slap a new sequestration order on you.”

  Riordan glanced briefly at Downing. Is this timing chance, or does he still have enough connections to—? “Have you heard?”

  Now it was Downing who looked surprised. “Heard what?”

  “The results of my physical. At Walter Reed.”

  Downing shook his head. “No. Tell me.”

  Caine did.

  Toward the end of Caine’s one-minute synopsis, Downing appeared so stunned that he almost veered off the promenade. “So that’s why The Patch was pushing,” he murmured.

  “Who or what is ‘The Patch’?”

  “Doesn’t matter.” Downing was already refocused. In fact, he seemed more focused than Caine had seen him since the war. “It so happens I can get you out.”

  “So you’ve said.”

  “No, Caine, I’m talking about a radically accelerated timeline. Even more accelerated than I was assuming five minutes ago. That Slaasriithi treatment might be much more than an elixir; it could be the bloody fountain of youth. And they will not allow you to leave when they realize that you are the only known source.”

  “Yep. That’s why I’m trying to leave. But it takes time to get the State Department to—”

  Downing turned and took Riordan by the shoulders. “Caine, this is no longer about how fast you can act. The only question is how fast I can act. And, with the help of some friends, the answer is, ‘very fast indeed.’”

  Caine frowned. “Just how fast is ‘very fast indeed’?”

  Downing checked his wristlink, nodded at what he saw there. “We’ll have you on your way tonight.”

  PART TWO

  Collective Space and Earth

  September 2123–July 2124

  CUSTODES

  Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

  (Who shall guard the guards themselves?)

  Chapter Eleven

  NOVEMBER 2123

  DEEP SPACE BELOW THE ECLIPTIC, WOLF 424 A

  Caine flinched awake. The alternating tone of the “all-clear” wasn’t deafening, but neither was it a sound one could sleep through. But that was just fine with Riordan: it meant that the shift-carrier Down-Under had completed its transit from Wolf 359 and was safely beyond CTR space.

  Riordan propped himself up in his combination acceleration couch and bunk, felt a subtle sideways tug; the ship’s rotational habitat, or rohab, was slowly resuming spin. He resisted the urge to lie back down. Drowsiness was exerting an even greater force than the slowly increasing gravity equivalent. By scheduling shifts toward the end of passenger sleep cycles, commercial carriers minimized tumbles and injuries from post-transit vertigo.

  However, Down-Under was currently a commercial hull in name only. She had been leased by the Commonwealth government for a logistical run to Wolf 359 and then the naval depot at Lalande 21185. Most of the eighty conscio
us passengers were civilian contractors who disembarked at the first stop, hired to update the automated facilities there. The remainder were naval personnel who were subsequently briefed that there would be a previously undisclosed stop before they reached the naval depot: Wolf 424. What they did not know was that a Dornaani ship would be waiting there for Caine. Hopefully.

  Riordan unstrapped, rose into a sitting position. The gravity equivalent was already close to point two gee. If Captain Kim Schoeffel ran the ship according to civilian norms, she’d stop the steady increase when it reached point three, then push it up another tenth of a gee every half hour or so.

  Caine stood, moved carefully to his stateroom’s locker, pulled out a civilian duty suit fitted with an EVA hood and liner: his invariable daywear. The civilian contractors had joked about it amiably, alternately ensuring him that the hull was leakproof and that the war was over. Riordan had just nodded, smiled, and silently hoped they’d have no reason to regret their jibes.

  He attached a drinking bulb to the tap, filled it to half. As he sipped the water and swirled it around in his mouth, the door’s courtesy pager emitted a single tone. “It’s open.”

  The pressure door slid aside and Ed Peña entered. Slowly. Which was how he did most everything, unless the tempo of events demanded otherwise.

  Riordan had seen that occur only once. Ed had been at the helm of the cutter Downing requisitioned to get Caine to Down-Under before she began her preacceleration burn to Wolf 359. When DWC drones began threatening to obstruct their rendezvous vector, Peña had gone into piloting overdrive, then alternately flummoxed and fooled the Jovian traffic controllers until the cutter was docked. As soon as the unwelcome excitement was over, Ed had slunk back into contented lassitude: evidently, his preferred state of being.

  Ed waited patiently just inside the hatchway. “You’re wanted in the captain’s ready room.”

  Riordan made for the door. “Why didn’t the comms adjutant just call me on the intraship?”

  “Same reason you’re being asked to the ready room instead of the bridge. To keep you from being seen in places or doing things that would suggest you’re an important passenger.” He hadn’t appended his sentences with “commodore” since they’d stepped aboard Down-Under. If at all possible, Riordan’s journey was to be incognito. But Caine could still hear Ed’s unvoiced addition of the military title, could sense it in the small nod with which he ended almost every sentence.

  Riordan nodded back and led the way.

  Walking a few dozen meters keelward put them in the rotranzo, or rotational transfer zone: the juncture where the parts of the ship that were rotating interfaced with those that were not. They stepped quickly from one slideway to the next, each slowing them until they were within the main, keel-following hull, motionless and in zero gee. Once there, Caine and Ed relied upon magboots and handholds to stay in contact with the deck.

  As they approached the ready room, the bulkhead-rated door slid open before Caine could touch the courtesy pager. Captain Schoeffel waved them in. “Good shift?” she inquired.

  Riordan smiled. “Can’t say. I slept through it.”

  Peña shrugged.

  Schoeffel returned Caine’s smile after shooting an annoyed glance at Peña. “We’ve finished our first set of scans. No sign of your ride, Commodore.”

  Caine raised an eyebrow. “‘Commodore?’ I thought I was ‘Mister’ Riordan.”

  She nodded at the closed door. “Benefit of privacy. I figure if we’re going to speak openly about your mission, we can dispense with the civilian labels they wanted to stick on you.”

  “That’s very kind, Captain. How can I help you?”

  “Well, you can start by telling me what we should be looking for. We’ve already swept the EM spectrum for any sign of a beacon or buoy. Nothing. So either your friends aren’t here yet or they are waiting and watching. Any idea which it is?”

  Caine shook his head. “Sorry, not a clue. The invitation was pretty short on details. It wasn’t even clear that they would wait here throughout the entire date range they gave us. And there was nothing about methods of signaling or their likely coordinates.”

  Schoeffel frowned. “For a supposed super-race, they don’t seem very organized.”

  Riordan shrugged one shoulder. “The Dornaani have their own ways of doing things. And they don’t always clue us in ahead of time.”

  Schoeffel waved Caine toward a chair, included Peña in a second gesture that looked a lot like an afterthought. “So when they do show up, what should I expect?”

  “Expect the Dornaani ship to be small, tiny by our standards. The one we’ve seen most frequently is one hundred eighty meters from bow to stern. Widest beam is at the rear: about eighty meters. Best estimates put it at about one hundred thirty thousand cubic meters.”

  “Okay, but how big are their shift-capable hulls?”

  Riordan smiled. “Captain, that is a shift hull.”

  “So they’re about fifteen percent as long as we are and ten percent of our volume. And they have longer shift range.”

  “I can personally confirm a sixteen-light-year range. I don’t know if that’s at the top, middle, or bottom of their performance spectrum.”

  Schoeffel’s features moved past incredulity, approached something akin to terror. “That exceeds the theoretical maximum of any shift drive built according to Wasserman’s paradigms.”

  Riordan nodded. “It’s pretty clear they use something else. Transition on them is not like on our ships. Or Arat Kur or Slaasriithi. You don’t feel that dip in your consciousness and then the wave of vertigo as you come back up. It’s as if your awareness is shuddering, like it’s a stone skipping across a pond.”

  Schoeffel leaned forward. “Any idea why that is?”

  Riordan nodded slowly, using that moment to consider. Schoeffel’s questions were nearing the limit of what she needed to know for the mission. Additionally, Caine had to be careful that his remarks did not raise suspicions that Alnduul and his fellow Custodians had allowed Earth’s experts to discover the secrets behind making deep space shifts. “I heard some of our researchers speculating that if the Dornaani drive doesn’t use stellar gravity wells to navigate, then its extreme precision could enable a rapid series of microshifts, rather than one big jump.”

  Schoeffel exhaled. “That could be what causes the shuddering of consciousness: a string of split-second blips in and out of space normal. Damn.” She seemed to stir from a daze. “So, do they even need to preaccelerate?”

  “No, but a ‘standing shift’ seems to put lots more wear on their drive. So they don’t use it much.”

  Schoeffel shook her head. “Do the Dornaani have any more magic tricks I should be aware of?”

  “Your sensors could have a hard time picking them up. Their hulls are unipiece, streamlined, and evince properties of both thermoflage and chromaflage. Our analysts call it comboflage.”

  Schoeffel’s face was stony. “So, the short version is that if they don’t want us to see them, we won’t.”

  Caine shrugged. “Anything else, Captain?”

  “Not at the moment, Commodore. Except, that I want you on hand when they finally show up, to make sure that everything goes smoothly.”

  Anything to keep me heading toward Elena. But what he said was, “I’ll be there, Captain.”

  Chapter Twelve

  DECEMBER 2123

  REFUELING ORBIT AROUND PLANET IV, WOLF 424 A

  For the thirty-second time, Riordan started his day at Wolf 424 A by turning on the commplex. Nine hours ago, just before rolling into his bunk, he’d finished his fourth complete read-through of all the available material on the Dornaani, taking notes as he went. Today, he’d start—

  The walls emitted the distinctive double yowl of the emergency klaxon: unidentified contact.

  Riordan was on his feet, moving toward his rack. “Q-command, hi-gee configuration.” His bunk began converting into an acceleration couch, a pressure-rated
cover rotating up into seal-ready position.

  Just as he reached it, his intercom chirped through a flurry of tones: message from the bridge.

  “Riordan here.”

  “Commodore, the captain asks you join her. All possible haste, sir.”

  Riordan smiled. “About time the Dornaani got here.”

  “No, sir. It’s not the Dornaani. It’s the Arat Kur.”

  * * *

  Peña was already on the bridge when Riordan arrived, half drifting, half glide-walking into the tiered chamber. Ed reached out an arm to ensure that Caine stopped where he intended.

  Riordan waved it off as he got a grip on the intended handhold, smiled crookedly. “Not a total newb.”

  Peña shrugged, didn’t say anything. It was unclear if that was simply his natural taciturnity or because he decided not to contradict his superior.

  Schoeffel came swim-dancing in from the other side, hooked a finger at Caine. “Come take a look.” She adjusted her drift with a slight deck-kick and bulkhead push; that angled her down toward the sensor station. She jabbed a finger at a cluster of five red motes. “Those bogeys are Arat Kur, or I’m a shave tail.”

  Riordan took hold of the back of the sensor officer’s seat, pulled himself closer. “Bring up whatever data you have on their thruster emissions.”

  “Mister—eh, Commodore Riordan, like I told the captain, they’re still two light-minutes out. We don’t have enough—”

  Schoeffel nodded at the officer. “Do it.” Face suddenly devoid of expression, he complied.

  Riordan glanced at the density of the particle trail, the heat of the exhaust, and its approximate shape. Nodding, he checked the acceleration of the oncoming craft. “Definitely not one of ours. Anything we have with that kind of performance leaves a much bigger exhaust smudge and lots more particles.” He looked up at Schoeffel’s face, saw eagerness and concern in equal measures. “How’d you identify them at this range, Captain?”

  “Same way you did: saw roach combat drones up close and personal, four years ago.”