David Weber - Empire from the Ashes

Except for him, Earth's surviving chiefs of staff sat in Horus's office.

Vassily Chernikov looked like a two-week corpse, but his face was relaxed. The core tap was deactivated at last, and he hadn't lost control of it. Gerald Hatcher and Tsien Tao-ling sat together on a couch, shoulders sagging, feet propped on the same coffee table. Sir Frederick Amesbury sat in an armchair, smoking a battered pipe, eyes half-shut.

Tama Hideoshi was not there. Tamman's son had found the samurai's death he'd sought.

Colin sat on the corner of Horus's desk and knew he'd never seen such utter and complete fatigue. These were the men, he thought; the ones who had done the impossible. He'd already queried the computers and learned what they'd endured and achieved. Even with the evidence before him, he could scarcely credit it, and he hated what he was going to have to tell them. He could see the relaxation in their faces, the joy of a last-minute rescue, the knowledge that the Imperium had not abandoned them. Somehow he had to tell them the truth, but first...

"Gentlemen," he said quietly, "I never imagined what I'd really asked you to do. I have no idea how you did it. I can only say—thank you. It seems so inadequate, but..." He broke off with a small, apologetic shrug, and Gerald Hatcher smiled wearily.

"It cuts both way, Governor. On behalf of your military commanders—and, I might add, the entire planet—thank you . If you hadn't turned up when you did—" It was his turn to shrug.

"I know," Colin said, "and I'm sorry we cut it so close. We came out of supralight just as your parasites went in."

"You came—" Horus's brows wrinkled in a frown. "Then how in the Maker's name did you get here? You should've been at least twenty hours out!"

"Dahak was. In fact, he and 'Tanni are still about twelve hours out. Tamman and I took the others and micro-jumped on ahead," Colin said, then grinned at Horus's expression. "Scout's honor. Oh, we still needed Dahak's computers—we were plugged in by fold-space link all the way—but he couldn't keep up. You see, those ships carry hyper drives as well as Enchanach drives."

"They what ?!" Horus blurted.

"I know, I know," Colin said soothingly. "Look, there's a lot to explain. The main thing about how we got here is that those ships are faster'n hell. They can hyper to within about twelve light-minutes of a G0 star, and they can pull about seventy percent light-speed once they get there."

"Maker! When you get help, you get help , don't you?"

"Well," Colin said slowly, folding his hands on his knee and looking down at them, "yes, and no. You see, we couldn't find anyone to come with us." He looked up and saw the beginning of understanding horror in his father-in-law's eyes. "The Imperium's gone, Horus," he said gently. "We had to bring these ships back ourselves... and they're all that's coming."

Dahak 's transit shaft deposited Horus at his destination, and the silent hatch slid open. He began to step through it, then stopped abruptly and dodged as fifty kilos of black fur hurled itself head-first past him. Tinker Bell disappeared down the shaft's gleaming bore, her happy bark trailing away into silence, and he shook his head with a grin.

He stepped into the captain's quarters, still shaking his head. The atrium was filled with 'sunlight,' a welcome relief from the terrible rains and blizzards flaying the battered Earth, and Colin rose quickly to grip his hand and lead him back to the men sitting around the stone table.

Hector MacMahan looked up with a rare, wide grin and waved a welcome, and if Gerald Hatcher and Tsien Tao-ling were more restrained, their smiles looked almost normal again. Vassily wasn't here; he and Valentina were visiting their son and making appropriately admiring sounds as Vlad explained the latest wonders of Imperial engineering to them.

"Where's 'Tanni?" Horus demanded as he and Colin approached the others.

"She'll be along. She's collecting something we want to show you."

"Maker, it'll be good to see her again!" Horus said, and Colin grinned.

"She feels the same way... Dad."

Horus tried to turn his flashing smile into a pained expression, but who would have believed 'Tanni would have the good sense to wed Colin? Especially given the way they'd first met?

"Hi, Granddad." Hector didn't stand; his left leg was regenerating from the slug which had punched through his armor in the final fighting aboard Vindicator . "Sorry about Tinker Bell. She was in a hurry."

"A hurry? I thought she was a loose hyper missile!"

"I know," Colin laughed. "She's been that way ever since she discovered transit shafts, and Dahak spoils her even worse than Hector does."

"I didn't know anyone could," Horus said, eyeing Hector severely.

"Believe it. He doesn't have hands, but he's found his own way to pet her. He'll only route her to one of the park decks unless someone's with her, but he adjusts the shaft to give her about an eighty-kilometer airstream, and she's in heaven. He barks at her, too. Most horrible thing you ever heard, but he swears she understands him better than I do."

"Which would not require a great deal of comprehension," a voice said, and, despite himself, Horus flinched. The last time he'd heard that voice with his own ears had been during the mutiny. "And that is not precisely what I have said, Colin. I simply maintain that Tinker Bell's barks are much more value-laden then humans believe and that we shall learn to communicate in a meaningful fashion, not that we already do so."

"Yeah, sure." Colin rolled his eyes at Horus.

"Welcome aboard, Senior Fleet Captain Horus," Dahak said, and Horus's tension eased at the welcome in that mellow voice. He cleared his throat.

"Thank you, Dahak," he said, and saw Colin's smile of approval.

"Join the rest of us," his son-in-law invited, and seated Horus at one end of the table. Wind rustled in the atrium leaves, a fountain bubbled nearby, and Horus felt his last uneasiness soaking away into relaxation.

"So," Hatcher said, obviously picking up the thread of an interrupted conversation, "you found yourself emperor and located this Guard Flotilla of yours. I thought you said it was only seventy-eight units?"

"Only seventy-eight warships ," Colin corrected, sitting on the edge of the table. "There are also ten Shirga -class colliers, three Enchanach -class transports, and the two repair ships. That makes ninety-three."

Horus nodded to himself, still shaken by what he'd seen as his cutter approached Dahak . The space about Terra seemed incredibly crowded by huge, gleaming planetoids, and their ensigns had crowded his mind with images... a crouching, six-limbed Birhatan crag cat, an armored warrior, a vast broadsword in a gauntleted fist, and hordes of alien and mythological beasts he hadn't even recognized. But most disturbing of all had been seeing two of Dahak 's own dragon. He'd expected it, but expecting and seeing were two different things.

"And you managed to bring them all back with you," he said softly.

"Oh, he did, he did!" Tamman agreed, stepping out of the transit shaft behind them. "He worked us half to death in the process, too." Colin grinned wryly, and Tamman snorted. "We concentrated on the mechanical systems—Dahak and Caitrin managed most of the life support functions through their central computers once we were underway—but it's a good thing you didn't see us before we had a chance to recuperate on the trip back!"

The big Imperial smiled, though darkness lingered in his eyes. Hideoshi's death had hit him hard, for he had been the only child of Tamman's Terra-born wife, Himeko. But Tamman had grown up when there had been no biotechnics for any Terra-born child; a son's death held an old, terrible familiarity for him.