John Ringo: Emerald Sea

“What’s wrong?” Sheida asked. “You’re calm on the surface but you’re not so calm underneath.”

“It is… personal, ma’am,” the inspector said, then sighed. “My wife and daughter are missing. I’m aware that most families were broken by the Fall, ma’am, but it doesn’t make me any happier. Now that I’m back in contact with higher, I am hoping that I can search records to try to find them. The problem is… as far as I knew, my wife was in the Briton Isles at the Fall. What is worse, my daughter was in Ropasa visiting friends.” He paused and then shrugged again. “Frankly, ma’am, I’m afraid that if New Destiny finds out who they are, and that I’m working for you, they will use it as a hold on me. If they do so…” He paused, his face hard. “I will be in a very uncomfortable position.”

“An uncomfortable position indeed,” Sheida frowned. “For reasons that I’ll get into in a moment, don’t discuss that with anyone except myself. If you encounter anyone who knew you before the Fall, tell them that you have definite proof that both of them died during the Fall.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Travante said, his face hard. “They might have.”

“I hope not,” Sheida replied. “We have very few assets in Ropasa or the Briton Isles. I think it unwise, furthermore, to put out any sort of feelers about your wife and daughter. Our intelligence assets have been being… ‘rolled up’ is the term, compromised and just as often interrogated and then Changed, with unfortunate regularity.”

“In that case, ma’am,” the inspector said, “please do not put out any feelers.”

“The unfortunate regularity is what I wish to discuss with you,” Sheida said. “I’m beginning to suspect that while we have not been able to get much intelligence out of New Destiny’s areas, the reverse is not the case.” She summoned a holographic representation of Norau and pointed to a series of red dots.

“While we can prevent Paul’s associates from teleporting into our territory, we cannot prevent communications or avatars,” she said. “But by the same token, since we’ve locked out virtually all programs under pass codes, we can detect when non-Coalition pass codes are being used, and non-Coalition avatars or projections are entering our territory. These are records of all such transmissions over the last six months.”

“That’s… bad,” Travante said, looking at the traces. They dotted the map like pustulant sores and were found wherever there were latter day concentrations of survivors. “This is just the last six months?”

“Yes,” Sheida frowned. “Some of them might be avatars appearing for a look at some occurrence. Paul still has a slight surplus of energy over ours and he is apparently using it for the development of intelligence.”

“Wise of him,” Travante said. “Trying to throw it at your shields, unless it’s extremely high power, would be a waste of assets.”

“But the problem is that we’re losing agents,” Sheida frowned. “And bleeding information to the enemy. You’re not the first inspector to turn up, although you’re the first Special. And I’ve set most of them on this problem. Eventually, I want you to have a close look at… possible problems in our higher command.”

“You mean in the Council?” Travante frowned.

“No, I’m sure of all of our council members,” Sheida replied. “I’d like you to investigate other possibilities. But before you do that… are you up for a long ride again?”

“At your command, ma’am,” the inspector said.

“I want you to go back to Newfell Base,” Sheida replied. “There’s a mission being prepared there. We’re definitely losing data from Newfell. There is probably more than one source. But I want you to insinuate yourself into the mission, probably as a sailor on the ship given your recent experience, and try to determine if there is an agent or agents amongst the crew. When you return from that mission, you’ll probably stay at Newfell, or in the Fleet, pending the outcome of the investigation.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the inspector said.

“Just that?” Sheida smiled. “Back on horses and stagecoaches, all the way across the continent?”

“How do I contact you, ma’am?” was all Travante asked.

“Hold out your left wrist, face up,” Sheida said. When he did she waved her fingers over his wrist and, for a moment, a picture of an eagle was superimposed on it as if by a tattoo, then faded.

“If you need to contact me, touch the eagle and say or think my name,” Sheida replied. “Sheida, Sheida Ghorbani, whatever. Just think of me . Edmund Talbot, who is a long-term friend and as trustworthy as they come, is going to be on the mission. If you need assistance, contact him. He will be informed that there is an agent of mine present. Try not to step on each other’s toes.”

“I won’t, ma’am,” the agent said, rubbing his wrist. There had been no feeling to the invisible tattoo, but there was a psychosomatic tingle left behind.

“As it turns out, you won’t have to take the coaches back,” Sheida said with a smile. “Although you might prefer it. There’s a dragon, a wyvern rather, that is headed that way. He’ll take you to Washan. You’ll need to hop once you get there to make it to Fleet headquarters before the mission leaves.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I will keep an inquiry out in my own awareness for your wife and daughter,” Sheida said. “If I find any information about either of them, I will contact you.”

“Thank you,” Travante said.

“Harry will give you your traveling money and brief you on how to get more,” Sheida said. “He’s not aware of your mission; you’re only going to be sent as far as Washan. Make the rest of the journey on your own.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Travante said, standing up. “By your leave.”

“Good luck, Inspector,” Sheida replied, standing up and touching his shoulder as she led him to the door. “I will pray for, and search for, your family.”

“And I will pray for you and yours,” Travante said, his face changing into a mask of amiable competence as the door opened.

The walk to Duke Edmund’s was mercifully uninterrupted. Herzer couldn’t figure out, for most of the walk, what was wrong. He knew that he was feeling intensively antisocial but it was more than that. Raven’s Mill was the town where, in many ways, he had grown up. Admittedly he spent less than a year in the town after the Fall, but he should have felt at home upon his return. God knew he’d thought longingly of getting back half the damned time he’d been at Harzburg.

But for some reason “good feeling” just wouldn’t come. For some reason the town felt like his uniform: Just a little too loose. Little changes, like a new sign over Tarmac’s tavern, stood out and left him feeling even more irritable.

Just as he reached the town hall he started to get a handle on the problem. Part of it was uncertainty about his future. The plans that had been sent to him during most of the Harzburg mission had spoken of bringing him back as a trainer. Not one of the sadistic madmen who ran the first phase — Herzer understood the importance of running the trainees into the ground while having no desire to perform the job himself — but as an instructor in the forming Officer Basic course. He was, in his opinion, more suited to taking the course, but the pool of trained officers was so small he could understand the need to throw him into the breach.

However, the peremptory “return at earliest possible moment” did not bode well for a routine training assignment. What he particularly did not want was to run into someone who might ask him why he was back so soon. And be in the position of being able to satisfy neither their curiosity nor his own.