“If that’s what happens to the uncivilized, I guess I’d better,” she said one hand still holding her jaw. “I had that coming, I suppose.”

  “You did. And you’ve got a lot more coming if you don’t pay attention to what I’m about to tell you.”

  She sat in the overstuffed chair beside the door. “I’d just as soon you didn’t hit me again.”

  Rochmon sat on the front of his desk, ignoring the mess on the floor for the moment. “I’m not about to hit you again, but Gilbert might – not with his fists, but he might use the power of his office to slam you hard. Hang it all, Bock, why can’t I get you to understand that you can’t run rampant through this headquarters insulting people and sexually assaulting people without having to pay for it sooner or later?”

  “So that’s what the problem is,” she said with a smile that quickly turned into a grimace. “You really hurt me.”

  “You hurt yourself or cause other people to hurt you. Did you know that in the largest country on Laurel if you spit on someone they can legally demand that your tongue be cut out?”

  “So, who’s on Laurel that we care about? And why should I have to nambyfoot around this headquarters? We’re all big boys and girls and neuters here, and it’s a tough world.”

  Rochmon sighed, then crouched down and started picking up the reports and putting them back on his desk. “Gilbert will be here in a few minutes. He’ll want me to defend you and explain why you shouldn’t be sent back to Sci-Sec or worse. And he’ll want you to defend yourself.” He paused as he picked up the last of the reports. “I think I’ll just let you defend yourself. No one person, however intelligent and valuable she is, can be worth the disruption you cause in my headquarters.”

  “Now wait a minute, Hew. If you think I’m going to –“

  “I don’t care what you think, Bock.” He stood up and moved back behind his desk. “It’s harder to defend you than it is to remember your full name – which, I gratefully believe, I have totally forgotten.”

  “Jectiverdifiaad Barrabockerman Montivillieo Questen Pasqualini,” she said in the musical accents of her homeland “Did I ever tell you what my name means, Hew?”

  “No, but don’t bother.”

  “It means the child of whore Pasqualini born in the gutters of Montivillieo. Nice name for a child to grow up with, eh?”

  “If you want my sympathy, Bock, it’s way too late for that. The travails of your childhood do not make up for your actions as an adult.” The sad expression on her face stopped him from saying anything else. He’d never seen her look like that, and despite what he had said, he felt sorry for her.

  “You think Sci-Sec will take me back?”

  Rochmon sighed. “Look, Bock, go back to your office and bury your head in the Q-Three. I’ll take care of Gilbert for you one more time. But this is the last time. Either you act in a civil manner in this headquarters from now on, or you face whatever Gilbert wants to throw at you. You don’t get another chance.”

  ‘‘I’ll try,” Bock said as she stood. “Thanks, Hew.” When he didn’t respond, she turned and quietly left his office.

  As he watched her go, Rochmon had a strange and sudden thought. Why had she told him the meaning of her name? In all the years she’d known him and all the times she had teased him about being the only person who could remember her complete name, she had never given him the slightest hint that it had such a meaning. Why now?

  He made a note to check her personal file again and to request that another in-depth background check be run on her parents. Rochmon didn’t know why he thought that was important, but the decision made him feel better, and that helped him prepare for Admiral Gilbert.

  “The Admiral’s here,” Rochmon’s aide announced a few minutes later.

  “Show him in, Farrandy.”

  “I don’t have much time, Hew,” Josiah Gilbert said as he strode confidently into Rochmon’s office, “so I’m going to give it to you by the book and get out of your way.”

  “By all means, sir, go ahead.” Rochmon could tell that the old man was in no mood for bartering.

  “You will do two things, Hew. You will tell Bock that if I receive one more complaint about her conduct, she will be called back to active duty and then be court-martialed if she so much as blinks in the wrong way. Then you will tell her that as of today she is being placed under restrained movement and will be accompanied all her waking hours when she is not in her office by one or more MGs.”

  “Isn’t that pretty harsh, sir?” Rochmon asked.

  “Yes, it is, Hew. But it was either that or have Stony lock her in the prison over there for ‘disrupting military during wartime.’ Any further questions?”

  “No, sir, I’ll tell her.”

  “Good. Oh, and Hew. Tell her I’m sorry about the MGs.”

  * * *

  “Not again,” Sjean said. “Please? Not again.”

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Birkie, but there are some things I believe are buried in your subconscious that I have to know, and we just don’t have time to dig it out any other way. Besides, you came through the last brain-search with no trouble. Why are you so afraid of doing it again?”

  “No trouble? You call not being able to sleep more than two or three hours at a time no trouble? You call this constant headache I have no trouble? What’s the matter with you Inspector? Did they make you surrender your compassion when you signed up for Sci-Sec?” This discussion was making Sjean’s low-grade headache turn into a real temple-pounder.

  I didn’t know about your headaches,” Janette lied, “but I doubt if they were caused by the brain-search.”

  “You know damn well they were. I never had these kinds of headaches before that.”

  “I am sorry, Doctor,” Janette said again, “but it has to be done. Please?” She held out her hand. “Don’t make me force you. I told you that an unwilling subject was the most likely to suffer side-effects.”

  Sjean stared at Janette until tears blurred her vision. Reluctantly, she took the Inspector’s hand and followed her down the same hall to the same office where she had gone through it all before.

  When they entered the office, Sjean felt suddenly calm as though a distant voice inside her was telling her everything was going to be all right. She didn’t understand it, but she gave in to it, glad to accept any reassurance.

  Again she lay on the table with the box over her head. Again she felt the burning prick in her arm and heard Janette speak soothingly to her. Again the questions started and the other voice inside her answered them until both of them blurred into quiet nothingness.

  Thel Janette truly felt sorry for Sjean Birkie and wished there had been some other fast way to get the information she needed. Since there was no other way as quick and accurate as this, she had no choice. But that didn’t mean she had to like what she was doing.

  “Dr. Birkie, do you know why the prototype weapon you tested did not function properly?”

  “Did function properly,” Dr. Birkie answered in a slow, thick voice.

  “I don’t understand. The test was a failure. Why do you say the prototype functioned properly?”

  “Wasn’t supposed to work.”

  That startled Janette. She had never suspected that the test was a deception. “Why wasn’t it supposed to work?”

  “Funny. Caugust called it dud, D-U-D, dud.”

  “What does that mean, D-U-D?”

  “He said it. Dud. Daringly Undestructive Device.”

  “You mean it wasn’t a real weapon? Just some piece of junk you put together?” Janette was finding this hard to believe, but if it were true – no. It couldn’t be true. Why would Drautzlab be willing to enter the auction for a piece of junk?

  “Oh, yes…it was a real…It could have worked.”

  “Why didn’t it work?” Janette pressed. “Why?”

  “Don’t understand. Couldn’t work. Incomplete.”

  “What was missing?”

  Dr. Sjean Birkie giggled. “The detonator. Didn’t have a real detonator. See? Isn’t it funny?”

  Janette bit her tongue to keep herself from giving an answer to that question. It was anything but funny. But she didn’t have time to worry about that. There were two more questions she had to have answers to. “Did you build a real detonator?”

  “Of course.”

  “Where is it?”

  “Secret. Can’t tell. Caugust said hush-hush.”

  “Tell me where it is,” Janette said slowly. “I can keep a secret.”

  “Mmm. All right. Here. It’s here. In the main test lab behind the blast doors.”

  “Just relax and sleep now, Sjean,” Janette said. “Sleep peacefully, and when you wake up, you will feel fine, and your headaches will be all gone. When you wake up tomorrow morning, you will feel healthy and happy, and you will not have any headaches. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes. Sleep. No headaches.”

  Janette patted her arm. “Good. It’s time to sleep now.”

  “Slee-e-e-ep. Goo-o-o-od.”

  As quickly as she could, Janette turned off the equipment and took the head unit off the bed. After covering Dr. Birkie with a light blanket, she dimmed the lights in the office and left in search of Caugust Drautz. She found him in the first place she looked, his office.

  “Have you finished questioning her?” He asked when Janette knocked on his doorframe.

  “Yes. Now I have some questions for you Dr. Drautz.”

  “Like what?”

  Janette knew from the tone of his voice that he was totally on the defensive. “Like why did you use fake equipment when you tested the Ultimate Weapon?”

  His already-ruddy face got redder. “We did no such thing.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Doctor. The weapon prototype you sent around GA-72-6694 was real enough. If it weren’t, you wouldn’t be so interested in getting it back. But the detonator was a fake. Dr. Birkie told me all about your DUD.”

  Caugust laughed unexpectedly. “Equipment failure, Inspector – yours, not ours. The detonator and the weapon were both real. Doctor Birkie lied to you.”

  Suddenly Janette had doubts, but only small ones. ‘“Then why didn’t it work? Why didn’t it explode two stars?”

  Ask the Inspector Admiral’s Office. They have all the data. They can tell you.”

  “I’ve seen that data, and it would take months, maybe years, to analyze it, even if they knew what they were doing, which they don’t. Either you give me the truth now or I’ll question you the same way I did Dr. Birkie.”

  “Oh, no. Not me, Inspector. You’re not getting me in your torture rack. No chance.”

  “Then tell me the truth. Why didn’t it work?”

  Caugust sighed heavily. “It was programmed to fail.”

  “Thank you. Now, I want the detonator you have stored away in the main test lab.”

  “You what? Inspector, I don’t know what you are –“

  “Either you turn it over to me,” she said menacingly, “or I’ll have you locked up and take this complex apart piece by piece until I find it.”

  “You win, Inspector. You win,” he said with a look of defeat. “But why do you want it?”

  “So that when I get the other part in this auction, Sondak will have a complete Ultimate Weapon to use against the Ukes, of course. Why else would I want it?”

  16

  HENLEY WALKED SLOWLY DOWN THE HILL, wishing he had done a better job of distributing the weight in his combat pack, because no matter how he tried to adjust it, he felt as if he were leaning slightly to the left. He paused for a moment to wipe the perspiration from his face and looked away from the bright orange heat of Mungtinez’s sun. He was sweating freely now in the warm, humid air and wanted nothing more than to find his unit and get out from under the sun and his pack.

  Putting his cap back on, he continued down the hill. The orderly rows of hundreds of stretchlon tents in the shallow valley below him reminded Henley of the beehives he had seen one time on Wallbank – or was it Yaffee? He couldn’t remember.

  Here and there among the rows of troop tents, larger domed tents indicated unit headquarters or officers quarters. According to the clerk back at legion headquarters, Delta Company’s tent was in the seventh row of Z-companies from the north.

  The clerk had been wrong.

  After asking directions several times and getting completely turned around once, Henley finally found the tent he was looking for on the ninth row. An orderly who was leaving the tent as he approached it told him he could go in.

  “What are you doin’ here, Chief?” Rasha’kean asked, rising from her chair as Henley came through the flap.

  “Following your career, Colonel.” He took off his pack and smiled with relief. It was noticeably cooler in the tent.

  “Get truthful,” Rasha’kean said, returning his smile.

  “Colonel!” he said with mock dismay. “You caught me. I’m actually here to make you keep a dinner date.” Rasha’kean snorted.

  “All right,” Henley said, “the truth. I requested an attachment to a combat unit, and General Archer asked me if I had any preferences.” He paused to wipe his face.

  Rasha’kean’s smile had turned into a slight frown. “And you chose my unit?” She did not think she liked that idea.

  “Not exactly.” He had noted the quick shift of her expression and wondered what she was thinking. “The general said he would assign me to a Z-company, which was fine with me. I didn’t know until I received my orders that you were the commanding officer. You don’t look too happy about that.”

  “I’m not sure I am, Chief. But I’m not sure I’m unhappy about it, either. Maybe I just d’not ken what to do with you. Please, sit down,” she said, sitting back in her chair.

  Henley was grateful for the chance to sit, even in a collapsible field-chair. His hike had tired him far more than he thought it should have. Got to get in shape, he thought, or I’ll never make it. “You don’t have to do anything with me, except put up with me – and tell me when I’m in your way or out of line,” he added.

  “I see,” she said slowly, then asked the question uppermost in her mind. “What is it that you’re goin’ to do in this unit?”

  “What I do is pretty simple,” he said, “too simple, some people would say. Basically I will stay with your company from now through the invasion. I’ll watch, listen, try to get to know your troops, and write my stories for the Service Archives.”

  “And the Flag Report,” she added.

  “Yes. For the Flag Report, but also the Courier-Times, and Intraworld News.”

  “Uh...ar’not those civilian controlled?”

  “More like civilian-government controlled. Actually, it’s rather complicated. I submit some my stories through the Flag Report Editorial Office to the Tri-Cameral’s Information Release Committee. They decide which stories to release to Efcorps, and Efcorps controls both the Courier-Times and lntraworld.”

  “But that’s censorship!”

  “Of course, Colonel. You seem surprised.”

  “I am shocked,” Rasha’kean said.

  “But why?” Henley asked. “You don’t think the Service would release just anything I wrote, do you?

  Rasha’kean hesitated. “Perhaps not, Chief, but on Ca-Ryn such censorship is very much against the law.”

  Henley laughed. “It may be against the law, Colonel, but I’d bet you a year’s pay that it happens all the time. No government can afford uncensored reporting. How do you think the Efcorps started?” It was a rhetorical question, but he paused, anyway, and gave her a chance to answer.

  When she didn’t, he continued. “Efcorps was the censorship arm of the original government on Biery, but it wasn’t called Efcorps then. That strange name is a rather recent addition. However, no matter how many times the name changes, the results are the same. News is censored for the good of Sondak and its citizens.”

  “Not on Ca-Ryn,” Rasha’kean said stubbornly.

  “Yes, on Ca-Ryn. Believe me, Colonel.”

  “I d’not Chief, nor will I until I have some better proof of it than a Teller’s word for it. You’ll not be taken’ offense to that, I hope?”

  “Not at all,” he lied. He resented her refusal to believe him – or her naive approach to the government, he wasn’t sure which. “However,” he said, “if I were you, I wouldn’t bet any credits I wasn’t willing to lose on that.”

  Rasha’kean did not want to pursue this discussion any further and decided it was time to change the subject. “Have you met my Executive Officer?” she asked.

  “No. Your orderly said the X.O. was supervising some training this morning.”

  “Well, Sergeant Denoro should be returnin’ soon, and I’ll let her find a place for you. If you want stories, I think you’ll find her an interestin’ trooper.”

  “Sergeant Denoro?” Henley asked, barely waiting until Ingrivia had finished speaking.

  “Yes,” Rasha’kean said. “Does that surprise you?”

  “I suppose it does. Not too many officers around anymore who would make a senior sergeant their X.O.”

  “Well, I’m one who d’not think all the oldy ways are bad, Chief, and experience is more important in my X.O. than rank.”

  “I didn’t mean to sound critical, Colonel. I was just flat-foot startled. Takes good sense to choose experience over rank.”

  And you di’not think I had good sense?” Rasha’kean teased.

  Henley shook his head. “You know better than that. How about dinner? I’ll even cook it myself if you can get us some F-rations. Brought my own kingjun hot sauce.”

  “When we get into combat, maybe.” She saw the flash of disappointment in his eyes and added, “For the F-rations, I mean. Tonight we can eat in the Officers Tank.”

  “If that’s what you want, Colonel,” he said with a tone of resignation, “but I guarantee that what I do with F-rats and hot sauce beats the normal fare at any Officers Tank.”

  “It’s easier to take risks in combat, Chief. Tonight I’ll take the safe menu.”

  “There you go again, Colonel, selling me –“ He stopped as a thin, dark sergeant entered the tent.

 

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