C. Cherryh - Cuckoo's Egg

The plane turned in flight. Pressure dragged at them, pulled at jaws and eyes and bowels and Thorn's nose ran; there was a pounding in his ears. The plane rocked. They went into a steep bank. (We're going to crash. We were hit.) Thorn rolled his head against the seat as his heart went wild and the sun spun up again and over the right wing.

"That's a miss on their side, a hit on ours. It's down."

(What are they talking about? The other plane? Betan?)

The milky light surrounded them again, implacable. On a screen a tiny point of light went out and Betan no longer existed, a plane scattered itself in shards and fragments, lives went out- ("That's a miss on their side, a hit on ours.") Their own plane had fired. That had been that shaking. And Betan was dead in a moment, with all her courage and her skill. ("It's down.")

"Betan," Duun said, "headed out over the sea and came back again. Points to her. She might have won it right then."

"She's dead."

There was a silence for a moment. The sky was incredibly smooth. Surreal again.

"There's a man named Shbit," Duun said. "A councillor. You know Dallen Oil? You remember your companies?"

"Yes."

"Well, they're not only oil, they're a lot of things. Energy, trade, manufacture. They've got a lot of power in council. They saw it slipping. They got Shbit elected: one of their own. Shbit wanted you transferred out of Ellud's wing and into one where things are more accessible- where you'd be more-public. Where politics could benefit by controversy. Where I could be weakened. They can't overthrow a hatani judgment. But they can undermine it. They can come at you from so many sides you can't track them all. Shbit tried that. He had a few ghotanin in his employ. Personal guards. They're ordinary as rain in private service. He had a few free-hatani he knew where to reach back home. A few kosanin, gods help them. And the fool got Betan past a fool of a personnel supervisor, the security chief, the division chief, Ellud- gods, five years ago; while we were still at Sheon. Brightest young security officer Ellud had. She ought to have been."

"Elanhen and Sphitti and Cloen-"

"Security as well. Sphitti's a free-citizen, son of a woman I know. Elanhen and Cloen from the station: kosanin. Damn good kids. Betan; free-citizen, career security. So they said. They left out pertinent details in her case."

The smoothness continued. The milky light never varied. To one side and the other cold terms like intercept flew on radios; ("It's down…") Lives ended. Beyond illusion-forests in city windows missile silos opened like flowers to the sun.

"… Betan knew we were succeeding. That was what tipped the balance. She had help, gods know; all of Shbit's resources, forged records. She made a foul-up of it even so-a free-ghota might be that careless. But she wasn't working for Shbit. She meant to foul things up. Kill you if she could. Doublecross Shbit. I know it was a possibility. I took my time settling that affair and it was damn near too much time, while I was working on those tapes."

"You-"

"While you were out. Daily. Constantly. Never mind that. I'd spread myself too far; I'd hastened things, and my time was occupied; and I was held to law. I traced Betan as far as Shbit. When I learned she'd surfaced again in Shbit's keeping and stayed alive- then I knew either Shbit himself was ghota or Shbit was being worked by one. I saw the pattern."

Thorn turned his face from the sun a second time and looked at Duun, at a face rendered faceless by the mask, sun reflecting on plastic eyeshields.

"Betan," Duun said, distant through the speaker, "may have been aimed all her life for what she did. Guild-service. A special kind of ghota. Gods know what the ghotanin had been feeding Shbit for information out of the department. Shbit was up against the ghota guild and totally outmatched… playing their moves against me and thinking they were his. Even Dallen Company. I can't say I didn't expect guild trouble. But there was law, again-I was trying to keep from destroying the council's autonomy. Dammit, they gave me too much. I let Shbit live because I knew he was a trigger I could pull, one the ghota would respond to. There's a spy in Ellud's office I 've let stay. Sagot's mine."

(Something's still faithful in this world. O Sagot, one bit of truth.)

"… And you did what we'd been waiting for."

"What did I do? That tape? That damned stupid tape? The numbers and the pictures?"

"You survived it. You survived it, minnow, and you read it. And the meds would know what you knew in one more day-and the instant they knew, that unstopped leak would send the news straight to our enemies; while Ellud wouldn't want to let you leave the building-I could overrule him, but he could have fought me on it and fouled things up beyond recovery. He's a good man; and honest; and he always wants more time than the opposition gives him. Some things I couldn't even tell Tangan himself. Like guild war. Like the fact I'd pulled the trigger."

"This Shbit sent Betan when he knew we'd left the city."

"You're catching onto it. He gave a ghota a courier plane and never suspected she'd been hired by her own guild to be hired by him. He had to give her a ghota crew: no kosan would fly her to us."

"Why come here for the gods' sake?" "She couldn't overtake us. For Shbit-she was supposed to go in and wail and howl and put on a good act. Disgrace you. Keep you out of the guild. Create scandal. For the ghota-she was to walk in there just the way she did and deliver a message from her guild. You read Tangan. He wouldn't bend. That's clear to you and me-but ghotanin have a guiding belief that everything can be bought if you set the terms up right; she walked in there and saw she hadn't the right coin… by her way of looking at it. It was clear when she said keep you out the way she did she wasn't talking for Shbit. Tangan knew it then. Read what she was and knew what I'd done to him and knew why. And forgave us both." Duun was silent for a long while.

And men and women died for them, would be dying, now, in planes which darted and fired missiles no one saw except on screens.

(Damn you, Duun. Is even this a maneuver?)

"I liked him," Thorn said at last. "I liked Tangan, Duun."

"I didn't betray him. I gave him the power he needed. I set him free. Do you understand?"

"To stop the ghota?"

"To back what I do. Don't you understand it yet, minnow? You will." Static sputtered, Duun's hand at the side of his mask clicking the other channel in. "How are we doing?"

"Dsonan's screen's going to drop in a minute to let us through," the pilot's voice came to them. "It's hot up ahead. Two missile strikes got to the base. The 3rd Wing's going to throw everything they've got at them while we get in, sey Duun."

"Gods save them," Duun muttered. "Gods save us all. Do it right, Manan."

"Damn sure trying."

Thorn eased over to look out the canopy as best he could. There was no sight of anything beyond their wings, beyond the pitiless sun and the endless sky.

Static snapped again. "Not to make you nervous, minnow," Duun said, "but what that means is Dsonan's keying its missile defenses down to give us a window to get in, and don't ask me what happens if something glitches. Kosanin are moving to be sure nothing gets through that gap for the five critical minutes it's going to take us to get through that screen. Then it goes up behind us. When we get on the ground we get over that side and off that wing: and it's going to be hotter than hell. You go down that wing edge and jump once I'm down. I'll steady you in landing. Don't think about anything, just run for that shuttle pad and go."

"Shuttle?"

"Tallest thing you'll see in front of you."

"I know what it looks like! Where are we going?"