David Weber: Ranks of Bronze

"There's no way into the Commander's quarters except through that door," Quartilla continued, "and it's controlled by the Commander's voice. There's no way out either."

"He says," said Clodius Afer, pushing toward the invisible door through men who scurried from his authority and from the anger in his eyes. The wrinkling grip across the front of the bodysuit made the Pilot seem shrunken in on himself as the centurion dragged him along.

"He says!" the pilus prior shouted as he stabbed the dagger into the center of the blank wall.

Blood scabbing across Clodius' right shoulder was jeweled with bright, fresh droplets as the muscles bunched beneath the skin. There was a thunk and a musical twang that would have been loud even in a room not hushed like this one.

Clodius' arm was numb to the elbow. He fell back a step, eyes widened in surprise. The dagger hilt was still in his hand, but the blade had snapped off at the crossguards and lay, still quivering out nervous tones, on the floor of what had been the Pilot's quarters. He dropped the iron hilt.

"No," said Pompilius Niger in a voice of unexpected certainty. "We'll use this."

The junior centurion had a bruise across the forehead where his shield had caught him while it blocked the carnivore's kick. He had lost or abandoned the practice weapons. What he now carried in his rough, capable hands was one of the lasers with which the crewmen had tried to face the mutiny.

The Medic trilled something that was an oath in any language. In desperate Latin directed more toward Vibulenus than it was the woman-authority taking precedence over mercy at this moment, though the reality of the situation was not what the crewman perceived-he said, "Please don't let him-if he touches the wrong thing, all of us, the ship even."

Men made way for Niger the way they had for Clodius, but this time the threat was in his hands instead of his face. In hot blood, most of the legionaries would have charged the beam weapon with the same reckless abandon the tribune and pilus prior had shown. Now, though… nobody wants to die after a battle, and memories of the laser demonstrations were still bright and terrible.

"Everybody move back," said Vibulenus, raising his voice to quiet the babble. Another problem occurred to him-his duties did not end with mutiny, unless the mutiny itself were ended-so he went on, "Fifth and Sixth Centuries, return to the Main Gallery. Keep people out, and tell them I'll make a full report as soon as we've mopped things up in here."

And might the wish father the result.

There was a stir and more obedience than the tribune had really expected. The ship was uncanny in many fashions. Familiarity did not help legionaries understand how the walls moved or carts floated through the air.

But these were familiar occurrences now, whereas the laser still commanded the awe which a nearby thunderbolt would receive in the legion's Campanian homes. The order provided an excuse to get away from something that even brave men would prefer to shun.

Clodius Afer had no visible qualms. He strolled back to the tribune and Niger, flexing the numbness out of his empty right hand. The Pilot, who was trying to hug his injured right shoulder, had no more control of his movements than would a dufflebag in the centurion's grip.

"Now," said Clodius to his captive in a tone of catlike menace, "why don't you tell us how to make this work?"

The two crewmen looked at one another with mirroring expressions of blank-eyed terror. The faces of the Romans around them ranged from expectant to ravening, with Niger's features the worst for their demonic calm. The junior centurion pointed the laser at the Medic's chest. His hands began to prod the bumps and knurlings on the weapon's surface.

"Don't!" shrieked the Pilot. "If you fire it here, you may strand us in normal-"

The pilus prior slapped his prisoner. His calloused palm cracked like a ballista firing, and the Pilot flopped stunned against the grip on his chest.

"I'll tell you just how to do it," said the Medic in a voice of manic calm. He spread both his hands, vaguely purple where they extended beyond his suit, toward the laser. It was the gesture of an adult placating a raging child-or of a suppliant before his god. "But please, don't touch the controls until I show you."

"Give the laser to Quartilla," Vibulenus decided aloud.

Clodius looked surprised, while Niger looked as if nothing could surprise him. With no more hesitation than if he had been asked to deliver it to the tribune or one of the other men, he handed the woman the tube with excrescences molded into it instead of being welded on. An article of plumbing, a length of foundry scrap… except that it burned like the heart of Phlegethon, and that made it useful.

"Please…" said the Medic in a voice that was quiet though not calm, the way a cat in ambush is quiet. "If you will point the other end-yes, like that, goodlady-toward the wall, the door."

Groggy, stunned enough that immediate consequences did not terrify him, the Pilot said, "You know what happens if she hits the navigation bank. Is this where you want to spend eternity?"

Clodius slapped him into a daze again.

The Medic made a swallowing motion higher in his throat than a Roman would have, then continued, "Now, goodlady, slide the piece just above the trigger-where your index finger is-back."

"Which piece?"

"Either side-yes, that's fine, it slides, yes, goodlady. Now-"

Vibulenus was wondering why the Pilot had spoken in Latin to his fellow. Stunned, yes; but under the circumstances, probably because they had no other common language.

The guild could achieve wonders, miracles-but it had a cheeseparing attitude that reminded the tribune of wealthy men at home who served fine wine to their immediate companions at dinner, but sent lees and vinegar to the lower tables. The Commander's duties required universal fluency, but those of the crewmen did not.

Quarfilla spoke all the ship's languages.

The laser's pale beam struck the door in a dazzle that could have been the tribune's sudden anger.

Startlement lifted the woman's finger from the trigger instead of clamping it there. Even so, the microsecond pulses had blasted cup-sized depressions in an ascending line across the face of what had been a blank wall. The material which had shrugged off a ram and a steel point slumped at the touch of coherent light. Bits which sprayed from the surface left sooty trails behind them as they sputtered through the air.

"Don't!" shrilled a voice. "Don't do that!"

Vibulenus spun around, keeping his grip on the Medic only by reflex. The words had come from The words had come from just beside the tribune's ears. The Commander had spoken, rather than someone in the immediate vicinity.

There was momentary silence except for the curses of a few men, close enough to the door to be burned when it spattered on them. The yellow-green surface of the wall was angry pink around the cavities and dull gray at their heart. It looked like pustulant worm damage on the skin of a fresh pear.

"Again," said the tribune softly, and Quartilla steadied herself over the laser tube.

"Wait!" bleated the voice. "I'm coming out! Put that down, I'm coming out!"

A legionary who had been smothering sparks on his thighs grinned and straightened. He cocked his practice sword back in an unguarded fashion that would have gotten him killed on the battlefield or knocked silly by an automaton in the Exercise Hall.

"Not without orders, ye fool!" snarled the pilus prior. He shook the Pilot as he would have a swagger stick. The loose-limbed crew member moaned softly in response, but the abashed soldier lowered his weapon.

"Put down the laser!" demanded the Commander's voice.

"Quartilla," said the tribune in a voice that crushed other sounds with its glacial power, "on the count of three I want you to begin burning the door until I tell you to stop. One-"