The Castle in Cassiopeia Page 5

  “We managed to exchange this one for the original on a world that was just as heavily protected, maybe even more so, than wherever he’s at now—and we did it with a team of six. You don’t accomplish things like this by spending hundreds of millions of lives on each side. Even if you pull it off, there’s not much left worth governing or ruling on either side when it’s over.”

  “Man’s got a point,” said Apollo, still manipulating the computer.

  “So what have you got so far?” asked Pretorius.

  “He’s not in the Democracy.”

  “Big surprise.”

  “Not in the Coalition’s territory either.”

  “Ditto.”

  “Believe it or not, he’s set up shop in what’s left of the Sett Empire.”

  “The Sett Empire?” repeated Pretorius. “We beat the shit out of them centuries ago.”

  “At great cost to the Republic,” added Pandora, referring to the Democracy’s predecessor.

  “Right,” agreed Apollo. “Not a bad idea, really. They’ve got a few thousand planets with structures already built, they’re closer to the worlds of the Coalition than to the Democracy, they haven’t been a military threat or power for a couple of millennia, and of course there’s every chance some of the locals still bear a grudge against us.”

  “After this long?” said Snake, frowning.

  “You just have to explain it in terms they understand,” said Apollo. She looked at him questioningly. “If you don’t pledge your loyalty to us and let us use your worlds and recruit your people, we’ll destroy half a dozen Democracy planets using your depleted military, and of course they’ll be quick to take their unequal and bloody revenge. On the flip side: the Democracy’s had nothing to do with you for a couple of millennia, since it was the Republic, and it has almost no trading agreements with you. They’re already enmeshed in half a dozen military actions, which is a euphemism for war. Do you really think they’re going to send a major force to your aid if you annoy us by refusing us?”

  “Shit!” said Snake. “You’re right.” A brief pause. “I hate being wrong.”

  “Okay,” said Pretorius, “so they’re in the old Sett Empire. But where in it?”

  “Soon,” said Apollo, uttering a number of rapid commands in a language that only Pandora and the computer understood.

  “Damn!” said Pandora after another minute had passed. “That’s a fascinating chain of connections. I never thought of that!”

  Apollo shot her a grin and said, “I’m flattered!” then turned back and uttered more commands. And finally, after three more minutes, he exhaled deeply, deactivated the computer, and turned to face Pretorius and Pandora.

  “I can’t pinpoint the exact planet. They’ve got too many defenses up, too much electronic camouflage. We’re going to have get over there and do a little reconnoitering.”

  “Get over where?” demanded Pretorius.

  “Oh, didn’t I say? Michkag’s set up shop somewhere in the Cassiopeia Sector.”

  “How hard can it be to spot a couple of billion soldiers and ships?” said Snake from the galley.

  “Harder than you think,” replied Pretorius and Apollo in unison.

  8

  “So should we start approaching Cassiopeia?” asked Pandora, moving to the pilot’s chair as Apollo got up and wandered over to the galley.

  Pretorius shook his head. “No sense telling them we’re here until we know where they are.”

  “What the hell?” growled Apollo.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Pretorius.

  “No beer!”

  “The galley was outfitted by the military,” said Pretorius.

  “And nobody in the whole fucking military drinks beer?” demanded Apollo.

  “Oh, shut up,” said Snake. “If you’re that desperate, I’ve got some.”

  “I liked you from the start,” said Apollo with a smile, “even if you do barely come up to my belt.”

  “It’s not a gift,” said Snake. “Five credits for a container.”

  “Five credits!” demanded Apollo. “They’re only two credits, tops, in any bar in the Democracy.”

  “Okay,” replied Snake with a shrug. “Go buy from a Democracy bar.”

  Irish and Proto were already laughing when Apollo reached into a pocket, pulled out a bill, and threw it at her. She held it up to the light, examining it, smiled, and returned it. “He does very good work,” she said. “Now give me a real one—and the price is up to six credits.”

  Apollo threw back his head and laughed, then reached into his pocket again, pulled out a ten-credit note, and handed it to her.

  “You want change?” she asked.

  “Keep it. You’ve been four credits worth of fun.”

  “You think that’s fun?” said Snake. “I could slit your belly open, top to bottom, for another fifty credits.”

  “I’ll bet you could, too!” said Apollo, still smiling. He turned to Pretorius. “I’m starting to like our crew more and more.”

  “Might as well,” said Irish. “You’re stuck with us.”

  “You’re stuck with me,” said Apollo. “A lot of people might find that more uncomfortable.”

  “A lot of people aren’t facing a billion-to-one odds,” replied Irish.

  “Yeah, well, there is that,” agreed Apollo.

  “Yeah,” put in Pandora. “Having him on our side probably lowers the odds to nine hundred and eighty million to one.”

  Apollo turned to Proto, who had projected the shape of a rather nondescript man to make his shipmates feel more comfortable. “Ain’t you going to pile on too? Everybody else seems to enjoy it.”

  “I’ve been piled on enough times myself,” answered Proto. “I don’t enjoy it, so why should you?”

  “Ah!” was the reply. “But I learned to do something about it.”

  “You’re more than eighteen inches tall,” said Proto.

  “Hell, even your name sounds heroic,” added Irish.

  An amused smile crossed Apollo’s face. “You think so, do you?”

  “Apollo is the god of art, poetry, music, medicine, and a bunch of other stuff, depending on which source you read,” said Irish. “Damned right I think so.”

  “Good,” said Apollo. “I chose well.”

  “You didn’t choose me at all,” said Irish. “I come with the ship.”

  He chuckled and shook his head. “I mean I chose my name well.”

  “You chose it?” she said, frowning.

  “Yes. You want to build muscles and learn to defend yourself? Grow up—if they’ll let you—with the name of Frothingham S. Platt,” said Apollo grimly. “I don’t know which I hated more, Frothingham or Splatt. You learn to defend yourself or you die young.” He grimaced. “So after I’d defended myself from a few hundred bullies and left the planet and went out on my own, I decided to come up with a name that, even if no one envied or even cared for it, wouldn’t invite almost daily attacks. I’m Apollo now, and I’ll kill or cripple anyone who says I’m not.”

  “They gave you degrees in your specialties without a last name?” asked Pandora.

  “They didn’t give me anything,” said Apollo. “I earned everything I’ve got.”

  “You know what I mean,” persisted Pandora. “What the name on your degrees?”

  “Apollo Zeus.”

  “Figures,” said Pretorius with a smile.

  “Zeus was Apollo’s dad,” replied Apollo. “And I’ll fight anyone who says different.”

  “Still, an interesting choice,” said Pretorius. “If I’d had your size and muscles, I think I’d have chosen Hercules.”

  “They’ve already got three or four guys called Hercules out on the Frontier,” answered Apollo. “I’m the only one of me I know.” He paused. “I’d love to go up against Michkag, mano a mano.”

  “Mano a thingo,” said Snake. “He’s no Man.”

  “And we’re not here to wrestle or box him,” added Pretorius. “Our job is to a
ssassinate him.”

  Apollo made a face.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Assassinate,” replied Apollo. “It sounds so . . . secretive. Let’s just walk up to him, kill the bastard, and be done with it.”

  “As long as he’s just as dead at the end of it, you can use any verb you want,” said Pretorius.

  “But first,” said Pandora, “getting back to the business at hand, we have to locate him.”

  “Shouldn’t be that hard,” answered Apollo. “He breathes what we breathe, and there are only seventeen oxygen worlds in the Cassiopeia Sector. He’ll want some freedom of action for himself and his troops; that eliminates five worlds with uncomfortably high gravity. They won’t want to import water; that knocks out three more. And you’ve contacted them or intercepted signals, so we know they’re still there and still alive. That knocks Benodi VI out of consideration.”

  “Why?”

  “Damned planet’s got some disease-carrying germs and insects that wiped out the whole population about twenty Standard years ago. According to a report I pulled up half an hour ago, the place is still teeming with them.”

  “Okay, that leaves eight worlds that might house him and his military,” said Pandora. “How do we narrow it down further—without using the ship for bait, that is?”

  “Send out an SOS,” suggested Proto, “and see where help comes from.”

  “And if help comes in the form of eight or ten enemy ships, what then?” said Pandora.

  “Okay, bad idea,” admitted Proto. “But how about determining which of those eight possible worlds have a lot of transmissions going to and from them?”

  “Makes sense,” agreed Apollo.

  “You don’t think the signals will be disguised and rerouted?” said Pandora.

  “Of course they will be!” said Apollo, still grinning.

  “Then I don’t follow you,” said Pandora, frowning.

  “That’s good,” said Pretorius. “I should have thought of it myself.”

  “Will someone please explain what you two are talking about?” said Proto.

  “You want to tell ’em?” said Apollo.

  “Sure,” said Pretorius. “We’ve got eight populated worlds in the sector. We know, or think we know, that one of them is Michkag’s headquarters. He’s only had a few months to move here, set it up, put in all his defenses, reset his various alliances. He’s capable of defending his world against attack, but he’s really not ready for a major war for another couple of years, at least not anywhere nearly as ready as he was in Orion.”

  “We all know that,” said Snake. “What do you and Apollo know that we don’t know?”

  “So far we’ve narrowed down his location to eight worlds just through logic, observation, and a little brainpower,” answered Pretorius. “He has to assume anyone could do that, could intuit what we know right now. So how does he convince us to pinpoint one of the seven worlds that isn’t his headquarters?”

  “Oh, shit!” exclaimed Snake. “Of course. He’ll have ten times as many messages coming and going from the other seven worlds, all in some code that translates out as gibberish and drives us crazy trying to dope it out.”

  “And each of the other seven worlds will have a few military ships in orbit,” added Irish, “guarding it against attacks that will only come if the attackers guess wrong, while the world we want will have no visible defenses at all.” She smiled. “But when we use our instruments, we’ll find that it’s far and away the best-guarded of them all.”

  “How do you like our crew now, Apollo?” asked Pretorius.

  “They learn quick,” he said approvingly.

  “So what’s next?” asked Snake.

  “We study the sector for a couple of days, see what they’re trying to direct our attention away from, and then . . .” Pretorius stifled a chuckle. “I almost said ‘then we attack,’ but of course we don’t. Then we sneak in, eliminate our target, and hope we can sneak back out again.”

  “That easily?” asked Proto.

  “Is anything ever that easy?” Pretorius shot back.

  “Not in this life,” said Apollo. “But from my observations, I figure you know that better than most.”

  “Oh?”

  Apollo smiled. “Nate, you’re a walking spare parts shop. I don’t know what’s in you, but you’ve got a prosthetic left foot, an artificial right knee, a replacement eye (and I hope it sees into the infrared or the ultraviolet or both), and that left ear doesn’t look quite real.”

  “Not bad,” said Pretorius.

  “What did I miss?”

  “Spleen, left lung, and just about all my teeth.”

  “Yeah,” said Apollo, staring at him, “those teeth are a little too perfect. My mistake.”

  “Could have been worse,” said Pretorius.

  “Oh?”

  Pretorius nodded. “Could have happened four or five thousand years ago, before they could fix or replace all these things.”

  “I don’t know about the rest of you,” said Apollo, “but I like working with an optimist.” He turned to Pandora, who was working the computer. “What are you doing?”

  “Setting it up to eliminate seven of the eight worlds within two to three Standard days,” she replied. “We’re now keeping a log on every signal coming and going from each world, plus every ship taking off, orbiting, and landing. And it may not even take that long.”

  “Why not?” asked Pretorius.

  “They’ve put a stealth code on most of the messages that a ten-year-old could break,” she explained. “They want it to look like they’re hiding things, but they’re making it awfully easy to see what they’re sending and receiving.” She paused and checked the codes moving across her screen. “Same thing with the ships. They want us to think they’re protecting themselves from observation with a stealth code, but like I said, any kid could break it.”

  “Good!” said Pretorius. “So we’ll know where we have to go in a day or two.”

  “If not quite how we’re going to get there,” added Apollo.

  “Oh?” said Irish.

  “They’re trying to direct us away from their planet,” said Pretorius, “but I assure you they’ll know we’re not one of their own as we approach, even if we capture one of their decoy ships from one of the other seven worlds. If we use a valid cloaking code, and they’ve got their entire planetary defense geared to spot such a thing, they’ll identify us before we even enter the atmosphere.”

  “And if we simply approach them in the open,” added Apollo, “because this ship carries no military insignia, even so they’ll be able to determine that we’ve got weapons, and more to the point, that we’re carrying a mostly human crew.”

  “So how do we land, once we’ve identified the planet we want to land on?” asked Irish.

  “Indirectly, that’s for damned sure,” said Apollo with an amused smile.

  “You want to define ‘indirectly’ in this situation?” said Snake.

  “We’ll have to capture one of their ships—one built for humans or oxygen-breathers who are relatively human in structure—and learn the codes we’ll need to land on the planet we want.”

  “And it won’t be easy,” added Pretorius, “because the proxies are there as disguise and bait. The last thing they’ll be allowed to do is land on the planet we’re after.”

  “But if he’s feeding a billion soldiers, they have to transport food in,” said Pandora.

  “Unless it’s an agricultural planet,” replied Pretorius.

  Pandora frowned. “Even so, it couldn’t be producing enough food to feed a billion soldiers of Michkag’s size.”

  “Unless they had a couple of billion citizens living there, and Michkag’s army wiped them out,” said Pretorius. He grimaced. “You’ve got to remember who and what we’re going after.”

  “So what do we do now?” asked Snake.

  “Pandora and Apollo will spell each other at the controls and the computer,” said Pretorius. />
  “And the rest of us?”

  “I should have thought that would be obvious,” he answered.

  “Oh?” she said.

  Pretorius smiled grimly. “We wait.”

  9

  And wait they did. Four hours passed, then five more, and Apollo was able to eliminate only one planet.

  “Damn!” he muttered, glaring balefully at the viewscreen. “This is the most boring war I’ve ever participated in.”

  “Beats getting shot at,” offered Snake.

  “Not if you know who to shoot back at,” he replied irritably. He got to his feet and turned to Pandora. “Here,” he said. “You try to spot the real planet. I’m gonna get something to drink.”

  “Limit it to water or coffee,” said Pretorius. “We’ve only got two beers left, and they’re both mine.”

  “You had the ship make them up especially for you?” demanded Apollo pugnaciously.

  “I bought a dozen on Bereimus III,” answered Pretorius. “They’re what’s left.”

  Apollo stared at him for a long moment. “Okay,” he said. “What the hell. If they’re yours, they’re yours.”

  Pretorius chuckled.

  “What’s so damned funny?” said Apollo.

  “If you hadn’t acknowledged my ownership of them, I’d have fought you before giving you one. But since you’re being a gentleman, or as close to a gentleman as I suspect you ever get, what the hell, have one and bring the other over to me.”

  “You’ve got qualities, Nate,” said Apollo, taking the last two containers from the galley and handing one to Pretorius. “Sometimes they’re a little hard to see, but you’ve got qualities.”

  “One of them is clearheadedness,” replied Pretorius with a smile. “I figure it might be a little bothersome trying to drink a beer right after you knocked half my teeth down my throat.”

  The line broke what minimum tension had arisen, and everyone laughed.

  Except Snake.

  “He’s not the only one who’d like a beer,” she said to Pretorius.

  “Are you going to fight me for the other one?” he asked in amused tones.

  “No, of course not.”

  “Good.”