Abysm (23 page)

“Field Marshal Gianno’s dead.”

“What? You’re certain?”

“They found her body in the rubble an hour ago. It hasn’t been made public yet.”

Gianno had just been on the
Stalwart II
; they’d shook hands and exchanged pleasantries. Miriam was…he honestly wasn’t sure how Miriam was going to feel about it. He took a half-step back…and internalized the information. He was a military officer who had outlived a lot of other officers. A curse, but only because it was a blessing.

He nodded soberly. “What else?”

“Two hundred eighty-three confirmed dead so far. The good news, if there is such a thing, is that much of the military leadership was attending the Federation Worlds Symposium that day and escaped harm. No, there’s more good news. Tessa here has already helped us track down and arrest three of the perpetrators.”

“Nice work, Tessa.”

He received a mumble and a sloppy hand wave by way of response; he noticed the glyphs on her arms had expanded to almost completely obscure her mocha skin. A morass of code scrolled faster than he could track across the three screens in front of her. He lowered his voice. “What is she doing, exactly?”

“Cleo’s been recording the transmission signal details in the OTS channel whenever Tessa has eavesdropped through the VISH. Now they’re scouring the logs for hooks back to the participants and cross-checking them against the chatter around the time of the bombing.”

“Huh.” He smiled a little. “What’s your role here?”

“Well, she’s been producing actionable intel every fifteen minutes or so for the last three hours.”

“And you’re authorized to act on this intel?”

Will shrugged. “Yes? Mostly? Graham left me more or less in charge. He’s with Chairman Vranas tonight. Because of the field marshal, I think.”

“Of course. They were—”

“Faith Quillen is in Cavare.”

They both turned to Tessa, but she had her nose back in the screens and was again ignoring them.

Detaining Quillen would be a big win in the battle against OTS, so Richard ventured in anyway. “Tessa, can you find anything else on her? A location, for instance?”

The Prevo held up a finger. They dutifully waited.

“Location is going to require more nodes of contact, but she gave the order to activate the explosives at Military Headquarters…and before she did she received orders to do it from someone on Romane. Hey, Navick, this is your guy from Pandora.”

“The one Devon had the run-in with?”

“Is
that
where the particulars came from? Hang on one. I’ve matched the transmission to Quillen with what’s tagged as prior communications from this guy, but this time he had to forego his usual safeguards. Maybe because Romane was kind of on fire at the time or something.”

She straightened up in her chair. “Ooh, we had separate chatter on Romane a little while earlier—and there’s enough for a ground location. Sent it to Requelme, since OTS could still be holed up at the same spot.”

Richard rolled his eyes at the ceiling. Much of the public criticism of Prevos was ill-informed if not outright false, but one thing was true: they held zero respect for proper procedures and policies. The Federation might be well on its way to having diplomatic relations with the IDCC, but it did not have those relations yet, and there were
rules
to be followed when sharing classified intelligence information like this.

Or not.

Tessa spun her chair round and round and round, sending her long braids trailing behind her. “I’ve seen this before, I’ve seen this before, where have I seen this before…Sutton, I have permission to access Level IV surveillance databanks, right?”

Will made a face. “Cleo does.”

“Good. Oh, I haven’t seen it before—but
she
has. High-level Alliance surveillance. Nice. Navick, do your former politicians realize how good we are at spying on them? Okay, standard filtering and such. Now to find….”

Abruptly Tessa kicked her chair back so hard it slammed into the wall behind her. She stared up at them, synthetically-enhanced eyes sparkling and wide. “Son of a bitch. I know who he is.”

22

SCYTHIA STELLAR SYSTEM

EAS
S
TALWART
II

E
VERYONE AGREED
S
CYTHIA PUBLICLY SIDING
with Miriam Solovy was a coup for Volnosti.

Everyone also agreed it would likely lead to an actual coup there, or a serious attempt at one.

Winslow couldn’t let a defection of this magnitude stand. She’d done a reasonable job of blaming Messium’s ‘defection’ on Admiral Rychen, portraying the Messium government as being under his thumb and beholden to the large military presence there.

But Scythia? Land of bright teal waters and happy, peaceful industry, with but a tiny military outpost of little note? Its support was not so easily mischaracterized, which left Winslow with only one good option: reverse it.

The one thing they hadn’t known was whether Winslow would attempt to reverse it via subterfuge or direct assault. Attempting both at once had seemed a doubtful choice. But here they were.

A shockwave generated by a negative energy missile detonation passed over the
Stalwart II
, and the floor beneath Miriam’s feet shuddered.

The very destructive and very expensive bombs were thus far the sole weapon which was able to reliably counter the strength and resilience of adiamene hulls. They did it by creating vortexes of unnatural forces which the miniscule seams where adiamene transitioned to viewport, engines and weapons could not withstand, thereby ripping the vessels into pieces.

Miniaturized versions of the bombs used in the Metigen War had begun to be produced several months earlier and fitted for missile deployment. But most military vessels used laser weapons, not physical, perishable projectiles, so the fitting required physical reworks to the weapons housing of individual ships. Thus the rollout had been slow.

All her new offensive ships were equipped with them, but practical storage requirements meant the on-board supplies were low. At least they were low for everyone.

The
Stalwart II
had been designed with an extra layer of shielding, two hundred meters out. Among other uses, it protected the ship from the full destructive force of the negative energy weapons. It had a few drawbacks, including being a tremendous power draw, and as such hadn’t yet been deployed on most vessels. But this was a command ship.
The
command ship.

After confirming they’d suffered no damage from the detonation, Miriam studied the tactical map. Despite the ship, she wasn’t a battlefield commander, but she was learning fast. Thomas helped with frequent but discreet, unobtrusive analytical assessments which appeared on a screen to her right. 

Admiral Solovy (
EAS Stalwart II
):  “Squadron V5B, concentrate your efforts on Quadrants A through C and protect the defense array.”

Matched against her fleet was an entire brigade-strength force. Fullerton had learned his lesson from Messium and brought far larger numbers to bear here. She was buoyed by the thought, however, that it may constitute the bulk of the forces in the Eastern sectors Winslow managed to retain control over.

The military was falling Miriam’s way.

The political class wasn’t proving as easy. Scythia stood to be a win on that front, but first she had to keep it.

S
CYTHIA

The wreckage of the bombed-out Astral Materials corporate offices had been cleared away, leaving a jagged half-shell façade of a building to overlook the waterfront. Under the light of a full moon it cast sharp shadows on the ocean waves and the boardwalk alike. A monument to OTS’ violence and terror.

On the positive side, the fact the entire area remained cordoned-off allowed Malcolm’s team to sneak through without worrying about curious pedestrians. Plus, the state of emergency which had just been declared thanks to the battle going on above was emptying the streets across a far larger region.

He motioned Grenier and Rodriguez forward to clear the next block. The government administration complex was ahead and to the left, a block in from the waterfront.

They were stealthed—but not invisible—they were few, and they needed to hurry.

They reached the complex without incident, as the streets remained quiet. But once there they were met with a chaotic flurry of activity. Understandable. The planet was under attack, and this was the hub of its government.

The governor’s chief of staff met him at the entrance. Malcolm didn’t want to cause a panic by sauntering in with a group of heavily armed Marines, so he ordered his team to remain in the background and cloaked. But he needed to take command of the situation.

“Ms. Cardona, Colonel Malcolm Jenner.”

“Yes, Admiral Solovy told us to expect you. We haven’t seen any problems here yet, other than a series of increasingly strongly worded communiques from the prime minister to the governor.”

“Has he responded to any of them?”

“The first one. The counter-response from the prime minister was brief and somewhat rude. They got worse from there.”

“It probably won’t be long then.” Malcolm glanced around the bustling hallways. “We need to get most of these people out of here. I recognize you’re in a crisis situation, but I need you to send every person who isn’t absolutely essential home immediately. Fifteen minutes from now, I need there to be less than ten non-security personnel in the building.”

The woman’s eyes widened. “Less than ten?”

“And eight is preferable to nine. These people will be safe at home. They’re not safe here.”

“Right.” The muscles in her jaw twitched once. “I’ll get on it. But first let me take you to the governor.”

He brought his people in then. They received a number of startled gasps, but those here understood the stakes tonight and were less surprised than they might otherwise have been.

The distinctive blue-on-white ‘Volnosti’ emblem on their shoulders over their Alliance gear broadcast his team’s allegiance, and he figured anyone who strongly disagreed with the governor’s decision had resigned in a fit and departed.

Cardona directed them into the office and headed off to clear the building.

Malcolm shook the man’s hand. “Governor Jayce.”

“Colonel. I confess I was skeptical the prime minister would dare try to forcibly depose my administration. But after receiving some rather colorful correspondence from her this evening, I believe she would burn me at the stake if she were able.”

“Not going to happen, sir.”

“Good.” The governor looked around and frowned. “Are some of your people stealthed? Or is this all of you?”

“That’s classified, sir. I can only say that we will protect you.”

He nodded. “I’m certain you’ll do your best.”

“Yes, sir. I’m linking us into your government security channel now. If you could authorize your security personnel to follow our orders?”

“If you believe it’s necessary. They’re good people, well-trained—but we don’t see a lot of action here.”

“I understand. I’ll only use them in a support capacity.”

Malcolm spent the next few minutes assigning the security officers to watch and guard positions. Mid-way through, Cardona reported on the departure of all but a handful of aides, and those aides were brought into the governor’s suite.

Sensors were placed at all entryways, including the non-obvious ones. In a smaller perimeter around the suite, proximity micro-bombs were also placed.

Rodriguez came on the comm from his surveillance vantage on the roof.
Two dozen Marines en route from the northeast. ETA three minutes.

Colonel Jenner:  Understood. Update every ten seconds.

He turned back to the governor, whom Paredes was helping don a tactical vest and a personal shield. “It’s time.”

EAS
S
TALWART
II