Doom Star: Book 02 - Bio-Weapon (24 page)

He set the tumbler and bottle on the desk. He went to his private closet, rummaging in the back until he found his old belt and holster. He strapped it on, looping the one belt over his right shoulder and hooking it to the belt around his waist. He slapped the holster. In it was a small gun, but brutal, a short-barrel .44 that shot exploding slugs.

He marched to the command center. People grew quiet. A few noticed the holster, although no one commented. He stalked about until they went back to work. Then he eavesdropped, trying to gage how far they would step out for him, for him personally.

With his new clarity, he was shocked to realize that it wasn’t very far at all. Maybe six months ago right after the asteroid attacks they would have. Today… some muttered about PHC’s latest purge. It was called the Anti-Rightist Purification.
Rightist
in SU jargon usually meant capitalists when referring to Outer Planets people or the military when talking about Inner Planets. It came to him that he’d been so concerned about his proton beams and merculite missiles that he’d forgotten to worry about the home front.

Theoretically, of course, all power in Inner Planets stemmed from the Directorate, the nine that guided the people through the principles of Social Unity. Also in theory, each director was equal. In fact, some were more equal than others were. Since the dictatorial days of the late Lord Director Enkov, Blanche-Aster had taken the mantle of leadership. In deference to her position, she bore the title:
Madam
Blanche-Aster. She deemed the title inoffensive but still original to her and signifying the manner of her guidance. “I am the mother of humanity,” she was fond of saying. “And as a mother I wish to be gentle but firm, unwavering as I uphold Social Unity.”

She backed him, and she forced the rest of the Directorate to do likewise.

A call two hours later showed him yet another crack in his position. Fortunately, he took the call in a side room, a communications center.

“General Hawthorne?”

“Yes, Director.”

The man in the wavering holo-image sat in a chair. He was a big man, a Venusian, and he wore an old-fashioned bond lord uniform. He had a square face and a blunt nose, with sagging jowls that wobbled as he spoke. He was seventy-five and he was therefore the youngest and most physically active of the Directorate.

Director Gannel swept a big beefy hand in a theatrical gesture. Heavy brass rings encircled each finger. He loved to strike poses as he spoke. It was an old habit from his hall leader days in the thorium mines.

Director Gannel had arrived several months ago from Venus. His was a daring tale of braving the Highborn space blockade of his terraformed planet and slipping onto an “open” farm hab orbiting Earth. From there he’d taken a grain transport down to Australia Sector and slipped aboard one of Earth’s last submarines and to India. In the readjustments that had occurred after the late Lord Director’s death, Gannel had skillfully maneuvered his way onto a director’s chair.

“Then the rumors aren’t true,” said Gannel.

“Rumors?” asked Hawthorne.

His jowls wobbled as Gannel smiled, showing big white teeth so obviously false that they made him look like a vampire.

You want to suck my blood, you obscene old plotter.

“Why, General, it’s been said that you were shot.”

“How very interesting,” said Hawthorne. “And who was the supposed shooter?”

“Why, I don’t know,” said Director Gannel.

“You do seem surprised to see me alive.”

The holo-image shimmered. HB jamming and the incredibly bad storms since the asteroid attacks had adversely effected communications. Soon the image settled down.

“Yes! I am surprised,” Gannel said. “Surprised that anyone would be fool enough to joke with me. To tell me you were dead.”

“Well, then, Director, if that’s all. It’s been a pleasure, of course, speaking with you.”

“Wait a minute, General. Now that I have you online there’s something, well, I hope I haven’t heard two wrong rumors in one day. But there’s talk that you plan to prematurely order the
Bangladesh
to break off its attack.”

And who leaked that?
Hawthorne wondered.
Oh, of course, the Air Marshal.

“Yes, Director. It’s time to cut and run.”

In his communications studio in New Baghdad, the big Venusian hunched forward, his brawler’s fists clenched, showing off the heavy brass rings. “Now look here, General, that’s just the sort of talk I’m sick of hearing.”

“Of a successful hit and run?”

“You know that isn’t what I mean. This entire… I’m going to use a word I hope you don’t find offensive, General: Cowardice.”

“Why would I find a charge of cowardice offensive?”

“I’m not calling you that, of course.”

“Ah, splendid.”

“But what else can one say to this suggestion of running away when we’re finally hurting these bastards?”

“I see. Then maybe you should consider this, Director. Three irreplaceable spacecraft didn’t cut and run in the Venus System. They stuck around to trade fire with the enemy. Those three missile ships were destroyed.”

“Of course they were!” said Gannel. “These piecemeal attacks of yours, General, are suicide.”

“A strategy dictates the tactics, Director. Our present strategy is the death of a thousand cuts, to bleed the enemy to death one Highborn at a time. There are only two million of them. Thus, one hits hard and runs, to fight another day. What one doesn’t do is trade blows with the Highborn or get greedy and go for more than is reasonable. Because their one great advantage is the ability to win any sustained engagement, usually with spectacular style.”

“Don’t lecture me. I know all about strategy and tactics. How do you think I achieved my rank?”

“We’re dealing with Highborn. Not Venusian rabble.”

The cold calculating stare of Director Gannel seemed to measure Hawthorne. “I’m going to be frank, General. We don’t like this splitting of the Fleet, this nipping at our enemy’s heels. Our battleships should be together and used to strike at one precise point, to break the grip of the Highborn one at a time at each of the four planets.”

“After we’ve sufficiently hemorrhaged them, yes, I quite agree.”

“We don’t have that kind of time, General. We must strike now! We must crush this rebellion before the Highborn gain allies from the Outer Planets.”

“It is we who should be seeking allies,” said Hawthorne.

“No!”

“Director—”

“You’d better listen to me, General. The Directorate is weary of your defeatist talk. Boldness! We want boldness in our planning.”

Hawthorne pursed his lips. With his cold clarity, he analyzed the situation. He nodded. “Very well.”

“Furthermore—what did you say?”

“I agree.”

“You agree to what?”

“Boldness.”

“If this is some verbal trick, General.”

“No. You’re right. This is a time for boldness.”

Director Gannel leaned back. “Uh, yes, yes, good. Very good, General. I’m glad to hear you say that. You are a man of reason after all. I just hope… Well. I’m glad we could have this talk.”

“As am I, Director Gannel.”

Gannel glanced at something in his room that was out of sight of his holo-projector. “I must beg your pardon, General, my agenda forces me to cut the conversation short.”

“Good bye, Director,” said Hawthorne.

The communications ended as the holo-image collapsed into a tiny dot of light and winked out.

It left General Hawthorne silent and thoughtful. He finally rose and began to pace around the holoset. What had Commodore Tivoli told him before her untimely death? There was rioting in New Baghdad, in the capital.

He whirled around and strode for the door.

No one would remember later who ordered the autopsy. But Air Marshal Ulrich’s corpse lay on an operating table deep in Bunker Command’s Medical Facility. Doctor Varro, the two technicians and a nurse discovered an odd reading from Ulrich’s skull. An x-ray showed tiny filaments running through the frontal lobes and a strange little lead device embedded near the pituitary gland.

“Can you make any sense out of it?” asked Doctor Varro. She showed them the x-ray.

The two technicians shook their heads.

“Nurse?”

“It’s ghastly. Sticking things in a man’s brain. Who did it?”

“Yes,” said Doctor Varro, a slender woman, who had helped create over twenty bionic men. “Who indeed?”

“Should we run more tests?” asked the more cautious technician.

Doctor Varro studied the x-ray. What was that little lead device beside the pituitary gland? Her green eyes shone with curiosity. “Get the cranial saw,” she said.

The nurse picked it up, a small circular saw, and handed it to Doctor Varro.

The more cautious technician grabbed the x-ray off the tray and peered at it again. He didn’t like it, not one bit.

The cranial saw
whirred
into life. Doctor Varro leaned over the skull.

“Excuse me,” said the more cautious technician. He hurried out of the operating room, heading for the lavatory.

Thus, only he survived the explosion that obliterated the corpse’s skull and killed Doctor Varro, the other technician and the nurse. For the next two-and-a-half hours, the more cautious technician retold his story to the MI operatives grilling him on what exactly had happened.
Don’t leave out any facts. Do you understand
?

He did understand, and he didn’t leave out any facts. Not even the one that he practiced mediation and firmly believed in gut level instincts. Didn’t they trust their own?

They did, so they drugged him, and were surprised to find out he was telling the truth—So much for the instinctual theory.

General Hawthorne paced. The reports lay thick on his desk. A spontaneous riot, they called it. Several directors had fled the city. Their location was presently unknown. Nor had he been able to get through to the Madam Director, who was said to be under siege in the Directorate Complex, on New Baghdad’s ninth level. Her communications were tied up, or else it was very good jamming.

His door swished open and in rushed his wife, Martha Hawthorne. She peered at him, her eyes worried and she came into his arms.

“James,” she whispered.

They kissed and he released her, looking into her face. She was small and in her mid-forties. Still a beautiful woman with dark, shoulder-length hair and deep dark eyes, she wore a modest executive outfit. Their only daughter went to school in Montreal, Quebec Sector. Martha ran financing for Data Corp., but she’d joined him at Bunker Command ever since May 10.

They spoke tenderly, and he unburdened himself. In time, she sat at his desk, scanning the reports. She picked one up, her eyes narrowing.

“Did you see this, James?”

He stopped his infernal pacing to frown at her.

“Cybertanks in the capital,” she said.

“In New Baghdad?”
She nodded.

“That seals it then.”

“James,” she said. “You must tread carefully. You know that PHC is already purging the army units you brought over from England Sector.”

“They tried to kidnap me, Martha. Turning Air Marshal Ulrich to do their filthy deeds! They even put electrodes in his brain.”

“But they failed to take you, my dear.”

“Only because of Captain Mune. The rest of the military—” He shook his head. “They’re paralyzed with fear and uncertainty.”

She set down the cybertank report and took to worrying a fingernail with her teeth. Despite his love for her, he disliked watching her do that. It annoyed him, but he’d learned to keep quiet about it. He resumed pacing.

“The bionic men are different,” she said.

“Quite.”

“No. I don’t mean the obvious difference of their bionics. They’re… Everyone hates them.”

He shrugged.

“They hate their strength, their power and bravery.” Her eyes widened. “They hate their individuality.”

“What do you mean?”

“The bionic men are different, James. They’re not SU. Consider: Each has been carefully crafted into a devastating fighting man. He’s unique, a one of a kind. Other people fear them because of that. Because most people are… aren’t unique. Thus, the bionic men avoid the masses, staying among their own. And as if to heighten their differences, the late Lord-Director gathered them into a single unit and gave them vast discretionary powers.”

“Police powers,” said the General.

“No, more an imperial guard power. They were loyal to him, guarded his interests when he wasn’t there.”

“Hmm,” said the General, recalling the horrible asteroid attack on May 10, how Captain Mune had stopped him from launching the nukes that might have broken up the incoming asteroids enough so that the proton beams could have annihilated the separate and much smaller chunks. But the late Lord Director had given a no-nuke launching order without his express permission. They hadn’t been able to contact him, and Captain Mune’s men, bionic warriors, had watched then in the Command Center to insure complete obedience to the Lord Director and his dictates.