Christopher Nuttall - Barbarians at the Gates

“And get me Captain Garibaldi,” Marius added. “I want to discuss opportunities for us in the Sphinx System.”

“Yes, sir,” Raistlin said. He paused, considering. “Do you wish him to report onboard Magnificent ?”

“No,” Marius said. Convention dictated that the junior officer visited the senior, but convention could go hang. And even though it was an aide’s job to keep reminding his admiral about protocol, Marius didn’t want to hear it. “I will settle for electronic transmission. Make sure that it is a secure link. We don’t want just anyone listening in.”

Jefferson System/Bester System, 4097

“The intelligence is remarkably precise,” Admiral Justinian said, “and that worries me. How do we know that it isn’t a trick?”

Caitlin considered the question seriously. The admiral had spent years building up an intelligence network on Earth—everyone who was anyone or wanted to be someone had their own intelligence network—but the Senate’s hasty counter-measures had wiped out most of his better-informed sources, along with hundreds of people whose only crime had been annoying one of the Senators charged with overseeing the purge. His few remaining sources had chosen to remain in deep cover and were very careful what they forwarded to the admiral.

She sighed. Like most governments, the Senate had shown a much more dangerous side of itself when its power was genuinely threatened. Their reign of terror, as unpleasant as it had been, had definitely produced results.

“You must admit that it holds up under scrutiny,” she pointed out after a long pause. “They only have two choices if they want to win within the year: reinforce Boskone to the maximum possible extent and attack from there, or push their ships through hostile space.”

“And take us up the backside,” Justinian agreed.

He stared up at the holographic display, studying the twin icons representing Marx and The Hive. Tactical icons orbited the two stars, the data already out of date. And yet, he was still more informed than the Grand Senate—or Admiral Drake. Admiral Justinian’s one advantage over the Federation was faster communications, and he used it ruthlessly.

“If you were in command of the fleet, Caitlin, which way would you go?”

“Marx,” Caitlin said automatically.

Justinian gave her a questioning look.

“It doesn’t matter how they look at it,” she explained. “A direct assault into a defended Asimov Point is going to bleed them white. It might cost them dearly enough to allow us to launch a counter-attack. If possible, they will seek to avoid such an offensive.”

Justinian bowed his head in thought.

“I cannot disagree with your logic,” he said after a long beat. “Look.”

He keyed the console and the holographic chart zoomed out. Admiral Justinian’s space was centered on Jefferson, the star that served as the terminus for nine Asimov Chains. Harmony, his capital, was at the end of one Asimov Point, but the others led to other parts of his empire, each one a nightmare to secure. The admiral had used most of his resources to build new starships rather than fortresses, and he hadn’t paid anything like as much attention to the Marx Chain as he should have.

In hindsight, Caitlin knew they should have been more concerned with blocking access to The Hive.

“If we send ships to Marx, they will be out of position if the enemy does try to mount an assault from Boskone,” he said.

Caitlin nodded impatiently. Justinian liked to outline and expound upon his thoughts, but she found it a little tiring.

“If we ignore the threat from Marx,” Justinian went on, “we face the risk of a powerful enemy force getting loose in our rear. How many worlds would dearly love to switch sides if the Senate gave them the opportunity?”

Caitlin scowled. Admiral Justinian had repealed most of the Federation Law that colonists and settlers saw as an imposition by grey men thousands of light years away, but he hadn’t put anything in its place. His rule was a military rule, and while a starship could be commanded by a draconian man, it wasn’t so easy to command an entire economy in the same fashion.

It hadn’t helped that he’d been diverting all his resources into building up his war fleet, which had caused shortages for the remainder of his empire. Planetary governments were going along with him, for now, but she had no illusions. Their professed loyalty would last until the Federation offered them a viable alternative.

Justinian pressed the point.

“Seriously, Caitlin—how many do you think would defect, given the chance?”

“Too many,” she said. “Maybe if we moved our ships to here—” she tapped the icon representing Samovar, a dull world orbiting a dim red star “—and held them in position? If there is a threat from Marx, we’ll know about it in time for the fleet to take up defensive positions and block the Asimov Point. If the enemy does intend to punch through from Boskone, we can move the fleet back to reinforce the defenses…”

“Workable,” Admiral Justinian agreed. He looked over at her. “And yet, something tells me that there’s something we have missed.”

Caitlin studied the display for a long moment. “And what might that be?”

“If I knew, I wouldn’t have missed it,” Justinian told her sarcastically.

She recognized the stress in his voice and refrained from saying anything.

“Cut the operations orders and move the fleet into Samovar, but order them to remain near the origin Asimov Point,” the admiral ordered. “We may as well hedge our bets as much as possible.

“Aye, sir,” Caitlin said. She grinned at him. “We will certainly receive warning before the enemy starts crossing the gulf between The Hive and Marx.”

“Let’s hope so,” Justinian said with a scowl. “My enemy is devious. I miss Admiral Parkinson. Perhaps I should have thought of that before I killed him.”

“Doubtless,” Caitlin agreed dryly. “At least we can be sure that Hartkopf won’t allow them to transit the Bester System.”

“You can always count on a weasel to weasel,” Justinian reminded her. “I trust Hartkopf about as far as I can pick up and throw an entire superdreadnaught.”

Colonel Scudder allowed himself a moment to study the governor’s private compartment, and then snapped his fingers for two of his men. When they arrived, he gave them orders to clear out everything in the compartment and to have it fumigated before anyone else tried to move into the section. He had no way of knowing just what Hartkopf had been doing in his private compartment, but the cushions, the filthy paintings and the vast array of expensive liqueurs suggested a number of possible answers. Hartkopf’s tastes, it seemed, ran towards the gross rather than the subtle.

To a man like Scudder, who had deliberately cultivated his thin and pinched appearance, complete with a sallow face and pale complexion, it was disgraceful. A Sector Governor should have more dignity instead of playing the sybarite while plotting rebellion.

He marched up to the fortress’s command center in a vile mood, which wasn’t lessened by the discovery that Hartkopf’s body—along with some of his most trusted subordinates—had vanished after he was assassinated. The people who might have known what had happened to the body had also vanished, although it seemed that they might have been killed in the fighting that had torn the system apart before the Grand Fleet arrived to restore order. He checked the list of remaining prisoners, compared them to the lists he’d been given before he’d left Earth, and allowed himself a relieved smile. His orders from the Senate had been clear and unambiguous. There would be rewards for those who followed orders, but those who disobeyed—even if they couldn’t carry out the orders—would regret it.