Yoon Lee - Ninefox Gambit

They divided up the summaries and the most relevant-looking of the individual reports. “I don’t suppose you’re also trained to handle intelligence work,” Jedao said.

The Nirai was now arranging cards face-up. At the center was the Drowned General. Cheris winced at the reference to her situation.

“Sorry,” Cheris said to Jedao. “Why don’t you tell me what to look for?”

“The obvious things. Who set this up, and how? With a locus like the Fortress, it can’t be accidental. Someone targeted the Fortress and succeeded. I’m surprised that the Rahal justiciars in residence didn’t catch it and get rid of the problem in the usual blunt Rahal fashion. Which suggests that a lot of parameters were held at the tipping point and nudged over at the right moment. That would have taken a lot of organization.”

“You’re suggesting a conspiracy,” Cheris said.

“I don’t have any evidence, but intuition’s worth something.”

Most of the reports were weeks old. Whatever had happened had been sudden. Communications had been one of the first things to go. Only when the lensmoth returned out of the twenty-five-strong task force did the hexarchs put the Fortress under interdict.

“That was smart, by the way,” Jedao said sarcastically. “With no outside news coming in, whoever’s in there doesn’t have a choice but to listen to whatever the heretics say.”

The Nirai was smirking again. “Yes, well,” he said, “what can you expect of a bunch of hexarchs?”

“It’s standard procedure,” Cheris said, stiffening.

“Of course it is,” the Nirai said.

She was puzzling over the Fortress’s internal politics – fractious, but the system encouraged faction rivalry – when Jedao spoke again.

“It’s only mentioned in passing,” Jedao said to himself, “but that’s a hell of a lot of ‘preliminary market research’ by the locals. Marketing what? The demographics are right there on file, unless…”

“What is it?” Cheris said.

“I have an overactive imagination,” Jedao said, “that’s all. I recommend that we bring a Shuos intelligence team for analytical support and a full company of Shuos infiltrators. There are going to be Shuos teams in the swarm anyway, but they’ll be watching you for signs that I’ve gotten to you. We need people who are devoted to figuring out the enemy. The more eyes the better.”

The more eyes the better. The Shuos watchwords. She hadn’t heard them in a while, but it was reassuring that even a Shuos as old as Jedao lived by them.

“I would be more comfortable,” Cheris said, “if I knew more about your plans to deal with invariant ice.”

She looked at the Nirai’s game again. He was constructing an elaborate card fortress. This must be what bored Nirai did. She had clearly missed out by becoming a Kel.

“When I was alive,” Jedao said, “an assault on the Fortress was a standard exam question at Kel Academy, and it was common as one of those no-hope wargame exercises in simulation. Is that still the case?”

“I’m not an examiner,” Cheris said, “but we might be able to get that information released to us. Sixth display?”

“Might as well.”

Cheris stared in fascination at the categorization system for responses to that particular exam question. Who knew Kel examiners had a sense of humor? Two categories that caught her eye were “heretical thinking” (expected) and “irredeemably stupid” (expected, but not phrased so bluntly).

“No wonder they didn’t want me as an instructor,” Jedao said in fascination. “I’d never have fit in.”

The Immolation Fox, an instructor? She hoped not. “Which category were you interested in?” she asked.

“Let’s check the distributions in ‘heretical thinking’ and ‘promote tomorrow.’”

A worm curled in her belly.

“Just the distributions, Cheris.”

Two percent of exam responses were classified heretical. Cheris suspected those cadets hadn’t lasted long, or had been shunted into less desirable positions with permanent warnings in their records. She probably had a similar one in her full profile, the one she wasn’t allowed to see, for deciding to wake Jedao up.

“I know better than to suggest you hack this for more details,” Jedao said wistfully. “You Kel are awfully stiff about that sort of thing.”

“I’m glad you think so highly of us,” Cheris said.

“Shuos habit, that’s all. You’ll notice you’re the ones with all the weapons?” He sounded as though he was pacing around the room.

“She’s not stupid enough not to have realized that the Shuos are the ones who decide where to point them,” the Nirai said unkindly. The fortress was bigger than ever. Cheris was impressed that it hadn’t fallen over in a blizzard of cards.

“Why did you apply to the Kel army?” Cheris asked Jedao.

Jedao stopped, or at least his voice wasn’t moving anymore. “It was a better fit,” he said. “I wanted to serve, and picking over intelligence reports made me twitchy.”

“Don’t believe him,” the Nirai said. He started taking apart one of the towers. “He spent more time assassinating people than doing analyst work.”

“Sure didn’t feel like it,” Jedao said.

Cheris changed the subject before it could go anywhere dangerous. “The top scorers have a lot of topologically complicated operations,” she said. “You can theoretically force a puncture by convincing the operator to do something mathematically unwise.” She skimmed a few of the proposals. “It looks like it requires machine speed and precision, though, and I’m guessing composite wiring won’t work near the Fortress.”

“If you see a topological solution,” Jedao said, “tell me. I’d need an augment to carry out something like that, and I’m unable to have one installed.”

“So if not that, then what?”

“I have almost the same information that you do, which should tell you something. Invariant ice was classified to the highest levels even in my day. But see if you can call up the file on the Fortress signifier tests.”

A nexus fortress could have a signifier? Cheris made the query.

The system informed Cheris that the file didn’t exist.

“Oh, for love of fox and hound.” Jedao thought for a moment. “Ask if you can speak to someone.”

Cheris did and was stymied by the form that came up.

“Sign it with my name. That might send up some flags.”

“My career is going to be very short,” she said, but did as he said.

“You’re a suicide hawk,” Jedao said. “It comes with the territory.”

The Nirai had finished disassembling the original tower and was building a new one with the same cards.

Eight minutes later, they were wondering if anything had gone through when a response arrived. It said, simply: FILES NONEXISTENT.

“Is that what Kel Command’s seal looks like now?” Jedao said. “I thought it was the ashhawk-and-sword. Or is that a subdivision?”

“That’s Records,” the Nirai said, “same as always.” He was adjusting a pair of cards from the Gears suit in the tower. One of them was the Deuce of Gears, and Cheris felt a chill: Jedao had taken it as his personal emblem, long ago.

“No matter,” Jedao said. “We do have a problem, though, which is that Kel Command is withholding information from us. That file exists unless they purged it, and they wouldn’t have done that.”

Cheris frowned. “They’re not being subtle.”

“They don’t need to be. We have no leverage. But it does tell us that they’re protecting something so important that its secrecy trumps the necessity of taking the Fortress back.”

This line of thinking made her nervous, but it was consistent with what she knew of Kel Command.