MIN

Despite the precise assistance of the gap scout’s homing signal, Punisher would never have been able to follow Trumpet if the encroaching Amnion warship hadn’t dropped fire in order to concentrate on her own acceleration out of the Massif-5 system.

As long as the Behemoth-class defensive continued to deliver torrents of matter cannon fire, as well as super-light proton blasts like thunderstrikes, Punisher was forced to maintain her staggering, frantic evasive maneuvers. Even when the cruiser had accumulated adequate velocity to hunt Trumpet across the gap, she couldn’t risk tach: not when she needed to alter her actual heading by the second in order to keep herself alive. If she’d used her gap drive to escape the defensive’s guns, she would have resumed tard so far off Trumpet’s trail that she would have required precious hours—or even days—to reacquire the gap scout’s signal. And in that time Trumpet might flee beyond recovery.

She might silence her homing signal, as she had once before.

Fortunately the dilemma of Trumpet’s departure was as urgent for the Amnioni as it was for Punisher. The alien warship found herself virtually stationary in a hostile star system, with her shields and sinks damaged, the target of her incursion gone, and an entire flotilla of enemy vessels burning toward her from Valdor Industrial. She had to run.

Helpless in her g-seat at the periphery of the bridge, Min Donner focused intensely on the actions of both ships, although she couldn’t do anything about them. Because Punisher had heard Vector Shaheed’s amazing broadcast, Min feared that the defensive would commit herself to destroying the cruiser.

She also wondered how long Sergei Patrice on helm could endure the strain of this ordeal. Glessen on targ did what he could to help; but the real burden of keeping Punisher alive now fell exclusively to Patrice.

Min suffered from nausea and vertigo herself, despite her years of experience and her eagerness for battle. And Punisher was a cruiser, a quick-strike vessel: she hadn’t been designed for this kind of hours-long pummeling, these brutal maneuvers.

Gradually it became clear, however, that whoever was “invested with decisiveness” aboard the Amnioni didn’t mean to prolong the battle. The defensive had other priorities. She continued to blaze at the UMCP cruiser while she shrugged her vast bulk into motion. But then, near the effective limits of Punisher’s ragged return fire, she broke off her side of the engagement, presumably so that she could dedicate all the power of her drives to acceleration.

Her vector away from the asteroid swarm didn’t point toward forbidden space, or any other obvious destination. Instead her immediate course aimed only at escaping Massif-5 as efficiently as possible.

“Cease fire, targ,” Captain Dolph Ubikwe ordered. Immobile as stone, he sat at the command station as if he were welded to his g-seat. “We aren’t hurting her anyway. And we might enjoy being able to hear ourselves think.”

“Aye, Captain.” Glessen keyed toggles, dropped his hands from his board. At once the hot, frying hull-sound of the matter cannon ceased. Without transition the squalling of half a dozen stress and damage alarms seemed to grow louder. Nevertheless after several hours of incessant fire Min felt that the bridge had become suddenly quiet.

“Stay sharp, Sergei,” Captain Ubikwe warned. “At the rate she’s pulling away, we’re probably safe from her matter cannon. But that damn proton gun can still reach us.”

Patrice mumbled a reply Min couldn’t hear. He looked too tired to speak any louder. The stark lighting of the bridge gleamed in the sheen of sweat on his face.

“Maybe not, Captain,” Porson offered from scan. “The sensors say she doesn’t have a targ fix on us anymore.”

At once the data and damage control officer, Bydell, put in numbly, “If we can trust the readings.” Remorseless pressure had worn the young woman down; but she clung to her duties. “We’ve taken a hell of a beating, Captain,” she explained. “Damage control says we have potential failure on half the receptors. Maybe she’s dropped targ. Or maybe we just can’t tell the difference.”

Min swore to herself. She wasn’t surprised: Punisher’s wounds could only have worsened under the strain of helm’s maneuvers. Still the ED director hated anything which weakened her command; threatened her people.

As Trumpet fled Massif-5, the gap scout had broadcast the formula for a mutagen immunity drug. This may or may not have been what Warden wanted—Punisher still hadn’t succeeded at deciphering the transmission which had given Nick Succorso control over Angus, so the director’s real intentions remained secret—but it transformed Min’s sense of her own mission.

She hated anything which might come between her and Trumpet.

“Damn her to flinders,” Dolph growled. He was studying the Amnioni’s escape trajectory. “It galls me to let her run. She’s a goddamn loose cannon.” He may have been talking to Min. “Who the hell knows where she’ll go off next? Could be anywhere.”

Min swallowed bile and frustration. She understood his implied complaint. He might conceivably have been able to finish the big defensive—if Min hadn’t ordered him to go after Trumpet instead of pressing his advantage when the Amnioni’s sinks began to fail.

“Can’t be helped,” she answered harshly. “We’re in no condition to chase her.

“Program a courier drone for UMCPHQ,” she went on. Punisher had only two left—too few—but Min didn’t balk at using one. “Bring Director Dios up to date on what’s happened. Launch it. Then get after Trumpet.

“If the Amnion think she’s worth an act of war to kill, she’s probably worth anything we can do to protect her.”

Almost as an afterthought, she added, “She probably isn’t safe. We still haven’t accounted for Free Lunch.”

Dolph swiveled his g-seat, turned his dark face toward her. A combative hunger smoldered in his eyes, promising trouble. He’d already declared his loyalty to her, however. He’d obeyed when she’d told him to turn away from the Amnioni. Despite his desire to hunt and kill the defensive, he didn’t argue now. Any trouble he caused her would take some other form.

“I’m sure you’re right,” he rumbled sardonically. Still holding Min’s gaze, he said to communications, “You heard the director, Cray. Code a message for Director Dios. Give him a datacore playback for the past twelve hours. We don’t have to explain it for him—he’ll figure it out. Tell him we’re letting the Amnioni go so we can chase Trumpet on Director Donner’s orders.” He emphasized that detail with a lift of one eyebrow, nothing more. “Program the best window on UMCPHQ you can get from scan and data. Launch as soon as you’re ready.”

“Aye, Captain,” Cray answered loudly; too loudly. She may still have been trying to shout over the absent sizzle of the matter cannon. “Give me five minutes.”

Captain Ubikwe met Min’s stare for another moment as if he were warning her. Then he swung his station to confront the main display screens.

“Take ten,” he told Cray. “We’ve got time. I want to make damn sure that bastard doesn’t have us on targ before we steady our course for tach.

“You hear me, Porson? Bydell doesn’t trust your equipment. Oversample as much as you have to. Get me a reading we can believe in.”

“I’m not worried, Captain.” Porson was older than the rest of the bridge crew; probably more experienced. “Scan is erratic, but what I see doesn’t look like sensor failure. It’s probably quantum discontinuities. There’s been enough matter cannon fire in this sector to charbroil a planetoid.”

Captain Ubikwe nodded. “Just be sure.”

Porson bent over his board as Dolph turned to helm.

“Hang on, Sergei,” he said in a reassuring growl. “You’ll get relief as soon as we cross the gap. I’ll take helm myself, if I have to.”

Patrice tried to smile, but his grin was sickly with fatigue. “I’ll make it, Captain,” he murmured. “We had tougher drills in the Academy.”

That was partly true. Min had designed some of them herself. But the worst of them had been hours shorter—

As soon as she returned to UMCPHQ, she intended to give Sergei Patrice the highest commendation she could think of.

Hell, everybody aboard deserved more than mere commendation. At the very least they ought to get a goddamn parade. Punisher had been damaged and shorthanded before Min joined ship; but Dolph’s people had risen to every demand she’d made on them. Nevertheless Patrice stood out—as did Hargin Stoval, the command fourth, who’d been injured fighting a fire which had threatened to gut the cruiser. Patrice couldn’t have run helm any better if he’d been driven by zone implants.

Abruptly Porson announced, “I’m sure, Captain. That defensive doesn’t have us on targ. And there’s a shift in her emission profile. The energy signature of her proton gun is gone. The cannon isn’t charged.”

Dolph looked quickly at data. “Bydell?”

“Data agrees, Captain,” the young woman reported, almost panting. Her eagerness to be out of danger left her breathless. “We’ve filtered enough of the inaccuracies. And a super-light proton signature doesn’t look like anything else. It’s hard to mistake.”

Good enough. “Let’s do it,” Min ordered Captain Ubikwe sharply. “As soon as that drone is away, let’s get out of here.”

Her palms burned with the intensity of her desire to catch Trumpet.

Morn Hyland was aboard, even though—so Min had been told—Angus had been explicitly programmed not to rescue her. She had a son with her, Davies Hyland, force-grown on Enablement Station. According to Angus, the Amnion thought they could learn how to mutate Amnion indistinguishable from humans by studying the boy.

Milos Taverner had turned traitor. Directly or indirectly, that betrayal had led the Amnion to commit an act of war.

For reasons which Min still couldn’t imagine, Warden Dios had given Angus’ priority-codes to Nick Succorso. And yet Vector Shaheed had broadcast the formula for an antimutagen—a drug which he could only have obtained from Nick.

The entire UMCP might collapse if the GCES or Holt Fasner learned the truth behind Shaheed’s transmission. Warden would certainly be disgraced; ruined.

What was Min supposed to do about that? What did the director want her to do?

And what had become of Free Lunch? Punisher hadn’t seen any sign of her. The ship which had unexpectedly saved Trumpet by attacking the alien defensive was some other vessel. The unnamed ship had pursued the gap scout all the way from forbidden space, only to die protecting her from the Amnioni.

Too many questions, all of them urgent.

Captain Ubikwe gave his people their orders; but Min wasn’t listening. Every nerve in her body was on fire to catch up with Trumpet.

Porson found the gap scout minutes after Punisher resumed tard on the track of Trumpet’s homing signal.

“Got her, Captain!” he said excitedly. He seemed to be the only member of the bridge crew with enough energy for excitement. “Right where her signal said she would be.”

A burst of relief spread across the bridge. Captain Ubikwe sat up straighter in his g-seat. “Thank God,” Bydell breathed. Roughly Glessen muttered, “It’s about time.” Patrice put his head into his arms on the helm board.

Min strained against her belts, studying the screens. The end of the vertiginous stress of evasive maneuvers left her light-headed and vaguely sick; her nerves jangling. She was viscerally hungry for g.

Then Porson frowned. Almost at once he added, “Which doesn’t make sense. She’s had plenty of time to hit the gap again. Even if she needed to rest for a while, she could have been long gone. But she’s still on the same heading she took from Massif-5.

“We’re moving faster than she is,” he finished. “At this rate, we can overtake her in a couple of hours.”

Dolph’s eyes widened as he considered the implications. “Is she waiting for us?” he asked Min. “Does she want us to catch her? After all this?”

Min didn’t answer directly. Instead she turned to scan.

“What condition is she in? Is she using thrust?” Min swallowed acid and apprehension. “Does she have us on targ?”

Porson didn’t hesitate. “We can feel her scan, Director. She knows we’re here. But she isn’t using targ. In fact”—he cleared his throat, looked at Captain Ubikwe—“now that you mention it, I can’t say for sure that she is Trumpet.

“She’s in the right place,” he explained quickly. “She’s the right size. But there’s no emission signature. No particle trace. As far as I can tell, her drives are cold.”

No thrust? No course alterations? The gap scout had come 1.4 light-years across blank space from the Massif-5 system—and now she was coasting?

Before Min could ask another question, Cray put in from communications, “That’s Trumpet, all right, Captain. She’s still broadcasting. The same message from Vector Shaheed. We picked it up as soon as we resumed tard.

“But it isn’t aimed at us,” she added. “It’s a general broadcast. So far, she isn’t trying to talk to us.”

“General broadcast?” Dolph growled under his breath. “What the hell good is that going to do out here? There’s nobody—” Then he caught himself. “Porson, are we alone? Any other ships around? Any sign of Free Lunch?”

Porson consulted his board. “Negative, Captain. Nobody here but the two of us.” He shrugged. “Of course, I’m blind on one side.” Punisher had lost a sensor bank to combat and fire. “But helm still has us under rotation. That gives us a steady sweep. If we had company, we would know it by now.”

The cruiser’s slight centrifugal g seemed to tug at the lining of Min’s stomach, hinting at vomit. Sergei Patrice had performed one more miracle by following Trumpet so accurately while Punisher turned.

Captain Ubikwe blew a sigh past his lips. For the first time in long hours, he permitted himself to show signs of strain. He shrank slightly, as if his bones were sagging inside his bulk, and his eyelids drooped.

“All right,” he said in a slow grumble. “Keep her on targ, Glessen. Just in case she tries to surprise us. Matter cannon charged.”

“Aye, Captain,” Glessen said. “I’m ready.”

“Good.” Dolph seemed to be thinking aloud. “So we’re alone. Just the two of us. So far, so good. And she isn’t trying to get away from us. That makes a change. In fact, she looks like she’s shut down her drives. Almost like she wants us to catch her. On the other hand, she hasn’t tried hailing us.”

Min needed action. “We’ll hail her ourselves,” she put in impatiently. “I want to talk to her.”

Dolph scowled at her. “In a minute,” he retorted. “I have other things to take care of first.”

Brusquely he keyed open an intercom channel and announced shipwide that the cruiser was about to resume internal spin.

His response bordered on insolence—no doubt a mere foretaste of the trouble to come—but Min was forced to approve, despite her frustrated urgency. Punisher’s people must have been desperate for normal g—and for a chance to move around. Most of them hadn’t been to the san for, hell, close to twelve hours. But Dolph hadn’t risked spin before the cruiser went into tach. If he had, core displacement might have sent her off course by several hundred thousand k.

While spin alerts sounded throughout the ship, Captain Ubikwe ordered his helm second to the bridge to relieve Patrice.

“Thank you, Captain,” Patrice murmured weakly. He may have been close to losing consciousness.

“No, Sergei,” Dolph countered. Despite his own fatigue, his voice was almost loud enough to echo. “Speaking for the whole ship, I want to thank you. You aren’t just good. You’re certifiably brilliant. If we ever get out of this mess, Director Donner and I”—he didn’t so much as glance at Min—“are going to throw you the biggest, loudest, drunkest, soppiest goddamn party you’ve ever seen. And I will personally court-martial anyone who doesn’t end up comatose.”

Glessen grinned wearily. Cray and Porson clapped for a moment. Despite—or perhaps because of—the deep strain of her fear, Bydell laughed aloud.

“Thank you, Captain,” Patrice said again. Although his eyes were glazed and his head wobbled on his neck, he managed a thin smile.

Shit, Dolph! Min thought bitterly. Stop this. I need to talk to Trumpet.

At the same time, paradoxically, she admired Punisher’s commander. His care for his people was invaluable. She suspected that if he’d ordered them to follow him through the gates of hell, they would have obeyed instantly.

Alerts finished warning the ship. Within her hulls, Punisher slowly began to revolve around her core. For a moment Min felt a sideways pressure as her inner ears and her sense of inertia—sensitized and aggrieved by so much violent motion—reacted to the change. Then the familiarity of shipboard g reasserted itself. Her viscera seemed to shift, as if they were being pulled back where they belonged.

Around her men and women groaned and sighed as they reacted to a comfort so acute that it was almost painful.

“But that’ll have to wait,” Captain Ubikwe continued to Patrice. “In the meantime get off the bridge. Emmett will be here in a minute. We can live without helm until then.”

“Aye, Captain.” Fumbling, Patrice undid his belts; lurched to his feet. At first his legs refused to hold him: he had to support himself on his console to stay upright. After a moment, however, he staggered away from his station and left the bridge.

Min didn’t move. She could have stood; eased the cramps in her limbs and the fire in her nerves by walking to the communications station and giving her orders directly to Cray. But as an act of self-discipline—or self-mortification—she remained in her belts; contained her discomfort and ire by force of will.

I have other things to take care of first.

“If you’re quite ready, Captain,” she said sarcastically, “I want to hail that ship.”

“I haven’t forgotten.” Dolph shifted his station to face her. “But I’m not sure I am ready.” He made no effort to conceal his weariness. By some trick of personality, however, he appeared to draw strength from it: fatigue fed his stores of insubordinate anger. “Earlier we were up to our ass in alligators. Well, we let that damn warship get away, but I can still feel something chewing on my hams.”

Here it comes, Min thought. Right now, while everything depended on contact with Trumpet, Dolph Ubikwe was about to make good on his promise of trouble.

Damn him, anyway.

“We’ve had to swallow a hell of a lot since you joined ship,” he began. “Nick Succorso, who is supposed to be working for DA, just happens to be the only human being in space with a mutagen immunity drug. By some amazing coincidence, DA reacts to Succorso’s presence aboard Trumpet by giving Free Lunch a contract to destroy her. But of course Succorso has his own personal geneticist with him, just in case he feels like having his antimutagen analyzed. That probably explains why Hashi Lebwohl wants to get rid of him.

“Unfortunately”—Dolph’s deep, rumbling tone sharpened trenchantly—“Director Dios is on a completely different page of the UMCP Code of Conduct. While Hashi Lebwohl tries to kill Trumpet, Director Dios orders us to supply Succorso with a cyborg’s priority-codes. In effect, handing Trumpet to Succorso.

“Are we confused yet?” Captain Ubikwe drawled sourly. “Sure we are. But there’s more.

“Much to nobody’s surprise—certainly not yours—Succorso heads for a bootleg lab. And when we see Trumpet again, Vector Shaheed is broadcasting the goddamn formula. Suddenly Succorso has been transformed. Now he’s a philanthropist. He’s an illegal and a covert operative, but he doesn’t want to profit from what he knows. He wants to share it.

“And he’s coasting. He’s been on the run all the way from forbidden space, and suddenly he’s by God waiting for us.”

Min clenched her fists, held herself still. Dolph obviously wasn’t done.

He took a deep breath to contain—or focus—his outrage, then went on.

“Naturally Free Lunch has disappeared. Director Lebwohl must have canceled her contract as soon as he suspected that Succorso was going to make his precious secret drug public. That makes sense, doesn’t it? Especially when you consider that as soon as this story gets out Director Lebwohl is going to spend the rest of his conniving life in lockup for malfeasance. Betraying his office, the UMCP, and most of his entire species.

“Meanwhile the Amnion have just committed an act of war, even though Thermopyle thinks they already have Shaheed’s formula. In any case, if they didn’t before, they do now. They heard it from Trumpet.”

Min tightened her grip on herself. She didn’t need Dolph to remind her that her decision to abandon the attack on the alien might have serious consequences for the whole human race. However, she believed that there was more at stake than Shaheed’s formula. She risked everything on that conviction.

Captain Ubikwe made a visible effort to calm himself. Slowly he sank back into his g-seat. When he spoke again, his voice was unexpectedly mild.

“Tell me what’s going on here, Director,” he finished. “I don’t think I can stand any more surprises.”

Min ached to snarl at him, Surprises? You don’t like surprises? You self-righteous, overweight sonofabitch, what makes you think I care what you like and don’t like? But she restrained the impulse. Despite the fire in her nerves, she understood him. For him what might happen to humankind if the defensive survived with Shaheed’s formula was a secondary concern. He cared more about his relationship with his people; the moral authority which empowered him to hazard their lives.

“All right, Captain,” she answered like acid. “I’ll tell you what’s going on. As soon as you tell me what Director Dios’ message to Trumpet really said.”

The words had been plain enough. Warden Dios to Isaac, Gabriel priority. Show this message to Nick Succorso. But they’d been embedded in some kind of machine code which Min hadn’t recognized and didn’t know how to interpret.

Dolph winced. Baffled indignation twisted his features. “God damn it, Min,” he rasped softly. “You know my people haven’t had time to crack that code. They’ve been at battle stations, for Christ’s sake.”

Min met his glare without remorse. “Too bad. That’s where the answers are.”

He bared his teeth. Still softly, he asked over his shoulder, “Cray?” Deciphering code was one of communications’ responsibilities.

“Aye, Captain,” Cray responded as she hunted her readouts. “As you say, we haven’t had much time. But before we went to battle stations”—she found what she was looking for; pointed at her screen while she raised her head to face Dolph—“we set up a sequence of parameters to test the code. Turned them over to data. They should have been running all this time. Maybe—”

She glanced uncertainly at Bydell.

Flustered, Bydell croaked, “I’m checking, Captain.” She hit keys as fast as she could; too fast. Biting her lip, she canceled mistakes, reentered commands.

“I’ve got the results,” she announced abruptly.

“The computer ran those tests. It doesn’t recognize the code. But it thinks it’s some kind of specialized programming language. Something similar to the one we use to write the instruction-sets for datacores.”

By God. Min held her breath. By God and Warden Dios. Under other circumstances—in another life—she would have flourished her fists and shouted aloud. Now she kept herself still while her heart burned like thrust and her nerves were etched with incandescence. Yes! Programming language. Wrapped inextricably around the words which had betrayed Angus and Morn and humanity.

Intuitively she understood what Warden had done. With one coded stroke he had outplayed Hashi Lebwohl and Nick Succorso and Holt Fasner. She thought she could feel the future he’d been striving for begin to take shape all around her; become real.

“Do you call that an answer?” Dolph asked in a congested voice, as if he were choking on uncertainties.

“Yes, I do,” she asserted without hesitation. “It doesn’t explain what’s happened to Free Lunch.” Hashi’s proxy had probably died in the asteroid swarm from which Trumpet had emerged broadcasting Shaheed’s message. “But it tells us everything we need to know about what’s going on aboard Trumpet.”

“Which is what?” Captain Ubikwe murmured helplessly.

Min scrubbed sweat like hot oil off her palms. “Director Dios has reprogrammed Angus Thermopyle.” She was sure. “The same transmission that turned him over to Succorso gave him new instruction-sets. New code.

“This is Warden Dios’ game.”

“Then what was the point?” Dolph protested. His tone hinted at anguish. “Why did he bother giving Succorso those priority-codes at all, if what he really meant to do was to change them?”

Min shook her head. “That’s none of our business.” She didn’t need inspiration to guess that the reason involved Warden’s secret, unexplained struggle with the Dragon. “The point is that this is Warden’s game. The Director of the United Mining Companies Police,” she pronounced fiercely, “is pulling the strings here.”

This was why Warden had sent her aboard Punisher: to ensure that the game would be played his way.

“He hasn’t told me what his game is. Are you going to say he’s wrong?” She challenged Dolph squarely. “Are you going to claim he isn’t doing exactly what his oath of office requires?”

No, Dolph wasn’t going to make that claim. She could see it on his face. His resistance slumped like heated paraffin on his heavy frame. Like her, he’d been under Warden’s spell for years. He would have followed Warden through the gates of hell as willingly as any of Punisher’s people would have followed him.

He spread his hands to concede defeat. “Then I guess we’d better find out what’s happening aboard that gap scout.” A glint of humor came back into his eyes. “Before Director Dios decides to chew off anything the alligators haven’t already eaten.”

Finally.

Min made no pretense that she wasn’t in a hurry. Slapping off her belts, she flung out of her g-seat and strode swiftly toward the communications station.

By the time she reached it, Cray had already opened a channel so that she could hail Trumpet.