John Maddox Roberts - Spacer: Window of Mind (15 page)

She went to the dumb-waiter that had delivered her breakfast last time and she touched a plate labeled
menu.
A long list of delicacies reeled up the screen. Most of the items she had never heard of. She spoke into the screen, ordering some items she remembered from the diplomatic banquet the evening this all started. Then she added a few extra items: "Oh, yeah, send me a key or something that'll open this door, and have a shuttle ready to take me back to
Space Angel."

A voice came out of the screen. "No problem with the chow, kiddie, but the other items we can't supply. Nice try, though." It wasn't the same one she'd had her run-in with, but it was the same breed. The food arrived within minutes, and she ate it as if she hadn't a care in the world, for the benefit of watchers.

She dabbed her lips with a damask napkin and wondered what to do next. As long as she had lived on the streets in Civis Astra, she'd never spent a single night in jail. She was sure that most jails were a lot more primitive than this, but it was a prison, nonetheless. She prowled around for a while, looking for some possibility of escape. She was not surprised when she found none. She wouldn't have been locked in here if the place was easy to escape from. She wondered if her shipmates were under attack right now, and steered her thoughts away from that. There was nothing to be done about it, and it would only cause her grief to think about it. Eventually she stretched out on the bed. It was liable to be a long night.

When she woke up, she knew that there was somebody else in the room. She made no sudden moves. It might be to her advantage if whomever it was thought she was still asleep.

"Don't try to be clever. You are awake. Your breathing changed, and in any case, I sprayed you with wake-up mist." Uh-oh, that was Izquierda's voice. She was wide awake, all right, mist or no mist. She sat up and swiveled her feet to the floor. Izquierda was sitting in the chair, impeccably tailored and with a long, tobacco cigarette between the thin fingers of one hand. His booted legs were crossed elegantly and he regarded her with an impersonal venom that turned her spine to ice. She figured it was probably his idea of appearing amiable.

"I guess you're going to tell me what this is all about now?" she said.

"As much as you need to know. I imagine by now you have heard dear Gertrude's version of our little
rencontre
during the War?"

"She says you let a bunch of refugees and POW's get killed to save some Satsuma ships and cargoes."

"Accurate enough, as far as it goes," he said reasonably. "It was a business decision. Those people were not paying customers, and the cargo shippers were. As for their deaths, I didn't kill them, the Triumvirate forces did. That is what military organizations do in war, Kiril, they kill people. Ours did, too. You will notice that none of the surviving Triumvirate officers were prosecuted after the War for those killings. But I was singled out, by your beloved captain, for court-martial!" For a second he let the wild-animal look show through, and Kiril knew that she hadn't been wrong the first time. She had to play this carefully. The man kept his beast leashed, but the leash was short.

"She says you divided your forces, too. They got wiped out buying you time."

He shrugged. "Service personnel are expendable. I expended them, that is all. Popular propaganda makes much of the value and sacrifice of the brave military people, but at the upper levels it is different. They are just numbers, counters in a game. Some are sacrificed for the higher goals of the game. Some die and some make it home. Usually, who does which is a matter of pure chance."

"Looks to me like you didn't leave it to chance whether you got out alive."

He smiled, genuinely pleased. "Yes, I'm glad you perceive that. The superior player does not allow himself to be a pawn. Instead, he weighs all factors in his own favor before going in. I was already a wealthy man working with one of the greatest lines before the War began. I protected myself with my wealth and influence. It's easy with naval people, you see. I received an important commission, and I secured the strongest personal support from both my subordinates and, especially, my superiors. Should any difficulty come up, as indeed happened, I had my flanks covered."

"Why is it so easy to get navy people to cooperate?" she asked.

"Simple. They all knew that once the War was over, naval forces would be cut to a fraction of their wartime strength. Even if we were victorious, most naval officers would be without ships. Those who cooperated with me and always looked out for my interest, received fine positions with the Satsuma Line after the War. Likewise, I was empowered to promise high executive offices with the line to those officers who secured lucrative shipping and shipbuilding contracts for Satsuma."

"No wonder you got to be a director after the War."

"Precisely. My activities during those years very nearly doubled the size of the Satsuma Line and made it by far the richest in all of human-occupied space."

"Things must be a little slow now, in peacetime," Kiril said. She wondered what this was all leading up to. Izquierda really seemed to relish this opportunity to brag of his accomplishments. For good reason, he probably didn't get to crow very often.

"It has been, but I'm about to remedy that," Izquierda said.

"What do you mean?" This sounded even worse than she had dreamed.

"In a few hours I am going to start a war with those aliens down there." He smiled triumphantly.

It took Kiril a few seconds to decide she had really heard right. "Are you serious? You're going to touch off a war? You must be crazy! What makes you think we can beat them?"

"Oh, I have no idea whether we can. In any case, I have no intention of taking part in the actual hostilities. I've already done my share of that for the line. No, you don't understand what the great corporations are like. They are very nearly immortal. Satsuma Line is nearly two hundred years old. It has gone through dozens of wars, and emerged richer from each one."

She felt a dismaying sense of unreality. This madman really meant it. "But those were wars between humans," she said, trying to be reasonable. "How could you profit from a war if we lose to an unknown enemy?"

"I've done my homework," he said, brushing a fleck of ash from his knee. "I have studied everything your friend Homer has told us about the civilizations at the center of the galaxy.

Besides, I believe in a certain historical inevitability. Intelligent beings want power and they want to expand their species. These creatures seem to have a technological culture very much like ours. The major obstacle between us appears to be language. We shall fight a very long and profitable war with them. If we win, we may double the size of human-dominated space. Plunder for everybody."

"And if we lose?" Kiril asked.

He made a graceful gesture with his cigarette. "In that case, there will be tremendous opportunities for those who cooperate with the conquerors. With the proper attitude and precautions, a great corporation cannot emerge poorer from any war. The only thing that can do that is mismanagement."

"So what's my part in all this?" she asked. Then she realized that this man trusted only greed. "Where's my percentage?"

Izquierda grinned. She thought it made him look like a skull. "Excellent question. When the navy confiscated
Space Angel's
records, I made sure to go over her personnel's records. You have only been aboard a few weeks. You are ship's girl, the most menial of tasks in space. It could take you many years to work your way even into one of the lower offices. Turnover in the small freighters is notoriously slow."

"It suits me," she said. She had to keep him talking while she figured a way out of this. Her brain worked frantically. This man was so terrifying that it was hard to think clearly in his presence.

"Oh, come now, Kiril," he said, amusement in his voice, "you're no old-time navy man like your friends Torwald and Finn. Nor are you a born-and-bred spacer like young Rabino-witz. What you are is a little guttersnipe from the slums of Civis Astra on Thoth. A few weeks ago your next meal was your most glowing hope. What do you know of the sentimental loyalties of spacers, or the realities of wealth and power?"

He leaned forward and said earnestly, as if it were truly important to him that she fully understand: "Kiril, I do not say these things to your disparagement. You came out of the slums of a squalid city. So did I. People born to fortune have no idea how important control of our fate is to people like you and me. And let me admit, you have impressed me. You are tough and intelligent and competent. 1 can use someone like you. I was most favorably struck by the way you handled that oaf down in the holds."

Just take it slow, she thought, and don't show how scared you are. "You found out about that, huh?"

"Oh, yes. You don't keep secrets from me in my ship. As it occurred, the fool's commander found him doctoring that scratch you gave him. The commander knew enough to notify me at once. I had the story out of the, dolt in short order."

"I'll bet you did," she said. "He regretting his mistake now?"

"He is too busy for regrets at the moment," Izquierda said. He dropped the stub of his cigarette in a recess in the chair arm and took another from his tunic. Its tip flamed as he'waved it. "He is learning to breathe vacuum. If he should master that difficult art, he can teach the sleeping guard, who is keeping him company."

"Sleeping guard?" she said neutrally.

"Yes, the one who allowed you to peek into the hold and see the ship I have there. It's a pity that you have told your shipmates about it. It forces me to move sooner than I had hoped."

Here was a possible edge, a tiny crack in his plan she might exploit. "What makes you think I told them about it?"

He looked at her with calculation. "I could find out." That threw a real scare into her. She wished she'd kept her mouth shut. "In effect, it's immaterial, though. 1 have already set my plan in motion on the assumption that you did. It's the only reasonable calculation. Did you tell them?"

Might as well go for broke, she thought. "Would I part with valuable information like that? I couldn't figure out what was going on, but I like to be aware of what's happening, you know? It comes of being raised in alleys and fighting for your dinner. You don't keep aware of what's happening around the corner, you can end up dead. Only, knowing about it and talking are two different things. You know to be safe. You talk when it's to your advantage."

This time he smiled with genuine delight. "I knsw you were a kindred spirit, Kiril. You could be very valuable, working for me. I think now you're in the right frame of mind to hear my oiler."

At last. "I'm listening."

He blew a stream of smoke, which was immediately whisked away by a vent. "I've already told you that I'm going to start a war. But, of course, I don't intend for people to know that I did il. No, the blame is going to fall upon your Captain HaLevy."

Oh, boy. "That's slick," Kiril said. "You get your war and your revenge at the same time. Neat."

"Yes, elegant, isn't it? I killed the others, like squashing bugs. But for her I've reserved something more fitting.
She
is going to plunge humanity into an unwanted war. However it turns out, her name will be a curse throughout history."

"You don't do things by halves, do you?" She forced admiration into her voice. "Now let's hear about me."

"I need a witness. A witness from
Space Angel.
The others shall die, but you will be spared. You were, after all, a mere ship's girl, newly signed on to the ship. You had nothing to do with the awful plan, of course, but you had discovered it and you were locked up while it was carried out. You'll tell a most tearful story before the Great Court. You'll receive much sympathy, poor, innocent girl that you are."

"Wait a minute! I don't like that. The part about the court, I mean. They'll drug me and put all kinds of snoops and instruments on me. No deal!"

He sat back and laughed gently. "Kiril, my dear, you still just don't understand. I can buy
anything.
You'll be expertly coached, to begin with. You shall have psych treatment to evade any drugs and override any instruments. On top of that, I'll own the people administering the drugs and the tests. The people operating the instruments will be taking my pay. I may even have the judges in my pocket, but that's not important, because they'll have to find in your favor with so much evidence."

"You're asking a lot, for me to get up and lie right in front of the whole human race with my life on the line. What do I get out of it?"

He looked at her with those serpent eyes. "For one thing, you get to live. That wouldn't be the case otherwise." Her heart sank again. What hope did she have against this killer? "But I would rather buy people than coerce them. Mere fear often tempts people into hysterical acts. Self-interest, measured in terms of material gain and access to power, is something far more reliable, don't you agree?"

"If you say so."

He waved his hands, indicating their surroundings. "You've enjoyed living among these surroundings, haven't you? Quite a bit more lavish than what you've been used to, aren't they?"

"It's okay," she said. "But I don't mistake it for what real power's all about." She was pretty sure she had his measure now, but she had to be careful. Play it too cooperative and he'd treat her like a tool. Be too demanding, and he'd squash her like the bug he'd mentioned before. "Fancy rooms and nice food are fine, but stuff like this don't last. You've noticed by now that I don't order any booze or drugs. I don't like stuff that clouds my judgment. I figure you must've come to the same conclusion a long time ago. I can separate dreams from reality." She could see that Izquierda was trading on the similarities between himself and her. It might be a good time to play on that.