John Ringo - Cally's War

“Mike, for what it’s worth, and it may be worth a lot, I agree with you. This is not over. By no means. I’ll be meeting with Aelool tomorrow and will see what I can do. Mike, you and Sunday are top notch operatives. None better. I’ll tell you what — while discussions are still pending, run up some analyses and contingency plans. There’s no sense wasting your valuable time while we work through the process from this end.” Father Nathan’s eyes seemed to plead for understanding and time. Tommy could feel a cold, numb rage begin to radiate out from his center. This was Iron Mike’s daughter for God’s sake.

“Nathan, I would strongly suggest that you remind our little green friends that humans are not Indowy, and that we’re not inclined to be their water-boys anymore than we are for the Darhel. I would suggest that you put that reminder in the strongest terms possible. Loyalty down the chain to the memories of deceased agents is one thing. Loyalty down the chain to live and breathing agents had better be high on their list of priorities. And that particular principle has nothing to do with my relationship to this agent. If they’re even considering that it’s going to be acceptable to the human side of the organization to use denying an extraction, without even considering feasibility, as a way to get permanently rid of loyal agents they may have a problem with, then they need to know that they probably don’t have two human operatives in North America who will agree to work under those conditions. Make sure they know that. From me.” His tone was clipped and precise, enunciating each word carefully.

“Mike, all I can do at this point is to authorize you to work on those contingency plans and ask you to trust me. I would hope that I’ve earned that much over the years,” he said.

“For now, Nathan, I can deal with that. You need to get back to us with an update on this. Soon. Sir. O’Neal out.” As he spat into a coffee cup he’d bought on base for the purpose, his face had a bitter tinge that Tommy couldn’t recall ever seeing before.

Obviously that last shot had been Provigil-C. Felt like a quarter-dose. She knew what would come next. The “R” in SERE training was finally making itself useful after all. Forcible sleep deprivation to induce hallucinations and sleep-dep psychosis. No problem. Oh, she’d go just as loopy as anybody, but what she wouldn’t do was give up information. Now, as to what else she would do, that was anybody’s guess. She wouldn’t want to be the poor schmuck who walked into a room with her in that condition.

Meanwhile, they’d done her a tremendous unintentional favor by giving her an unmolested night to work with and the energy to use it effectively. Yeah, baby, go ahead and wake me up. One-two-three-four-five-six-seven-eight! Nice, clean jazz hands, and a stretch up to the sky and spin and down, push up to stand, hip walk to stage left, then round-off into a back handspring into a back flip half-twist, into a front handspring, and strut back towards center stage and turn, hands back feet spread, roll the head across the front and up and spin and spin and spin and stop and kick up into a vertical split, back down…

It was going to be a long night but she was up for it.

“Are we at a stalemate here?” Nathan O’Reilly clearly was not talking about the chessboard, which had at least five moves to mate, if the Indowy across from him made a particular mistake. And that was one of the shorter options.

“I do not know. Possibly. And it gives me grief to admit it. You humans cannot, or will not be other than what you are. And I have observed enough humans and read enough of your history to know that human organizations without what you call down chain loyalty simply do not work. They collapse of their own weight, as a tower whose antigrav fails.” His hands crossed briefly in the equivalent of a shrug.

“I understand why loyalty that only goes up the chain, Your Loolnieth, works for the Indowy. But don’t you have true reciprocal obligations in arrangements between clans? Can’t your people be persuaded to see the analogy?”

“I truly do not think relations between the Indowy of the Bane Sidhe and our human friends can go on as they have been. But your analogy interests me. Would it be possible for me to ask for some time to contemplate it without offending you? I do not know what may be done with it, but there is a leaf just beyond the reach of my hand. Alone, perhaps my thoughts can climb the tree.” He stood and almost turned, stopping and putting a hand on O’Reilly’s arm, instead.

“You do realize that I do not turn away from you or your species, that my need for contemplation is genuine, do you not?” The slight tilt of his head evinced concern.

“You don’t have to prove yourself to me, old friend. I trust you .” The priest withdrew and was gone.

General James Stewart’s doctors were none too happy to have him up and about the morning after being gut-shot. He had given them little choice. When they had waked him briefly to ask about certain necessary arrangements while he was undergoing regen, he had instead ordered them to stitch what could be stitched, and use surgical synthetics for what had to be patched. While true regen on the stitched parts could be continued with injections, the synthetics would have to be removed and would cause the regeneration process to ultimately take twice as long as it should.

The doctors had been even more unhappy when General Vanderberg had refused to allow them to overrule the general on medical grounds. But then, the military medical profession was pretty much agreed that general officers made lousy patients.

So here he was this morning, looking down at Sind… Sometime in the night Mata Hari had been abbreviated by the watchers to Mahri. He supposed there was some logic to having something to call her. For him, it only underscored the pain of not even knowing her name.

Two tall robed figures trailed by a couple of Indowy — strange sometimes how quickly humanity had gotten used to little green men — were approaching him, or the line of seats placed near him. Apparently, they had some interest in him, since they were stopping by his wheelchair, ignoring the medic hovering behind him with syringes full of medical nannites.

The Tir Dol Ron, and the Tir Dad Lin, according to his AID. He knew enough not to laugh or smirk or even show surprise at the Darhel with the funny name. One was the trade minister and the other the minister of education, who actually handled propaganda and public relations, such as it was. What they really were were cabinet level officials of a Galactic Federation where the Cabinet ran the show. In the words of Sergeant Franks, to whom he owed at least a mental apology, the V-est of IP’s.

“We wish to express our appreciation and approval for the apprehension of this person. We would like to assure you that you have greatly enhanced the interests of Galactic Security. We are certain that you have a bright future within the Fleet Strike Organization.” The voice was so beautiful he barely restrained the urge to vomit. The Tirs appeared to be waiting for something from him. When he merely nodded silently, the Tir Dol Ron started to lift one corner of his lip, revealing the edge of a very pointed tooth, but his eyes flickered to Stewart’s injuries and he appeared to relax. The two turned abruptly and proceeded to a pair of the seats, hesitating for a moment while the Indowy with them moved the seats closer to the glass.