Кристофер Банч - The Return of the Emperor

The manager was impressed. A service company actually servicing, without ten or twelve outraged screams and threats of legal action? Especially since he himself had been unable to find the original contract with APEX.

They stripped the suite bare of anything that went beep or buzz. Sten almost missed the conference table, then realized that it contained a simple computer/viewer suitable for reading, reviewing, or revising documents. But that, and everything else, went onto gravlifts, down into the bowels of Lovett Arena, onto the gravlighter, and then vanished.

It was more than a month before the arena's manager realized that he had been victimized by an exceptionally clever gang of high-tech thieves.

The machines were carefully loaded onto one of Wild's ships, sealed against any stray electromagnetic impulse, and transported to Newton.

Technicians went to work. Sten and Alex hovered in the background. They may have been somewhat sophisticated technologically, Kilgour especially, but this was far beyond their level of expertise.

It was almost impossible to erase anything from a computer. If a file were deleted, its backup would still exist. If the backup were deleted, the "imprint" would still be there, at least until something was recorded over it. Even then, restoration could sometimes succeed.

The computers were first. From them came an astonishing, confused burble of various contracts indicating that Lovett and his friends were hardly straight-arrow businessmen. That information was recorded for possible later release to civil courts, after and if the council was toppled. There were no computer phone records.

But that table was it.

Around it, years before, Sullamora had laid down the law to the other conspirators. At that time, he was the only one who had hung himself out to dry—contracting for the murder of the press lord, contracting for Venloe's services. He put it flatly—all of them were to sign a "confession." It was a card made of indestructible plas. On it was a formal admission of guilt, a preamble to assassination. Kyes had been the first to insert the card into the table's viewer and sign, and the others followed. Each member of the conspiracy received one card, signed by all members.

And a technician found it.

The retrieval was spotty, broken by intermittent images of a smiling older couple—someone's parents, possibly, interminably walking past some nondescript scenery. A homevid?

But it was still there:

WE, THE… PRIVY COUNCIL, AFTER DUE CONSIDER… COME TO THE… CONCLUSION… ETERNAL EMPEROR… INCREASINGLY AND DANGEROUSLY UNSTABLE… DETERMINED TO… FOLLOWING… TRADITION… STANDING… AGAINST TYRANTS… HISTORICAL RIGHT… REMOVAL… AND HEREBY AUTHORIZE… MOST EXTREME MEASURES… DESTRUCTION… TYRANNICIDE… TO ENSURE FREEDOM…

The document may have been broken, but it was quite obvious. And absolutely untouched at the bottom were the personal marks, the "signatures": Kyes. The Kraas. Tanz Sullamora. Lovett. Malperin.

"I'll probably be able to restore more, sir. There's still some ghosts I haven't ID'd and pulled off the hardware."

Sten was quite happy.

It may have been missing some nonvital screws and springs, but Mahoney—and the Tribunal—had the smoking gun.

Sten wanted a little R&R. Badly. He knew he had reason enough to feel brain-, body- and nerve-damaged, but guilt kept whispering in his ear. He ought to be sitting in the back of the courtroom, listening to the careful work of the Tribunal as it moved toward its conclusion.

This was a moment in history. What would he tell his grandchildren? "Yeah, I was around. But was off gettin' drunk and tryin' to get laid, so I can't tell you a whole lot."

Kilgour seized the logical high ground. "Clot th' gran-babes y' nae hae, an' likely ne'er sire. Gie y'self off. Thae'll be bloody work't'come. Gore aye up't' our stockin' tops."

Mahoney backed him, telling Sten that he did not think there was any likelihood that the Tribunal would want any evidence submitted of the blown murder run on Earth. "Still, Admiral. I'd prefer you were out of town if they start callin' witnesses. Get going. Enjoy yourself. I'll send if I need you.

"Which will be soon. Not surprisingly, the privy council is planning a response. With moils and toils, they've put together a fleet of their bullyboys. Most loyal, most dedicated, and all that drakh. Translation—those who got their fingers the dirtiest proving their loyalty during the purge.

"When they arrive, we should have a proper welcome. Otho's shaking out a strike element from his ships. He thinks nothing could be finer than to put you on the bridge." Mahoney laughed. "See how fascinatin' a career in the military is? One day a police spy, the next an admiral again."

Sten kept to himself his feelings about the military in any configuration, retired to his quarters, and thought about his vacation. Go to some tourist town and troll for company? No, he thought not. Not that he was suffering the pangs of lost love—at least he didn't think so. But no, it didn't feel right.

Cities? Not that, either. He had heard the yammer of the ugly throngs on Prime, and right now any city reminded him of that.

Stop brooding. Hit the fiche. You'll find something that jumps out at you.

He did.

Rock climbing—the hard way.

It was possible to climb anything using artificial aids-climbing thread, piton guns, chocks, jumars. So, of course, the "pure" climbers revolted and climbed with no aids whatsoever.

Sten thought that could be mildly suicidal. He was not that depressed. But there was a bit of appealing madness there.

He picked a climb—a vertical needle deep in one of Newton's wilderness areas—and equipped himself with a minor climbing outfit that included enough artificial aids to be able to belay himself as he climbed. He bought a tent and supplies and cursed when he realized he would have to carry a com and a miniwillygun. Most Wanted, remember, boy.

He found Alex and told him he was off. Kilgour, far, far too busy minding security on the Tribunal, barely had time for a farewell grunt and an arm around the shoulders.

Sten found his rented gravcar—and something else. He had forgotten that the word "solitary" was banned, at least until the present emergency was over and the council safely in their graves or prison cells. Waiting was his seven-Bhor-strong bodyguard and Cind, equipped similarly to Sten. He thought of protesting, but realized he would lose. If not to them then to Kilgour or Mahoney. It was not worth the battle.

But he issued strict orders.

They were to pitch camp separately from his, at least a quarter klick away. He didn't want their company—sorry to be rude—and he certainly did not want them on the rock with him.

"I don't think the council's assassins—if they have any tailing me, which I don't believe—will go boulder-swarming to make the touch."

The Bhor agreed. Cind just nodded.

"Easy order to follow, Admiral," one Bhor rumbled. "The only record my race has of climbing is when we were chased by streggan."

So Sten's R&R began on a somewhat less than idyllic note. That slightly off-key note continued to sound. The pinnacle was everything it had looked on the vid, punching straight up for almost a thousand meters through the low clouds. It was at the end of a small, rising alpine meadow with its own spring and bone-breakingly cold pond. The meadow was surrounded by the pinnacle's sky-touching big brothers. No one lived in the meadow, except for some small tree-dwelling marsupials, some long-wild bovines, and, Sten thought, a small night-loving predator he never saw.

He pitched his tent, and his bodyguard followed orders, pitching their camp one quarter kilometer, to the exact pace, away, semihidden behind brush on the other side of the pond.