The Night's Dawn Trilogy (16 page)

It made sense if you took the long-term consequences into account; a few million pounds spent now as opposed to the billions
any form of naval action would cost once Lalonde had a technoeconomy capable of building military starships. And God knows,
Ralph thought, the Saldanas approached every problem from that angle—with their life-expectancy long term was the only term
they understood.

Ralph smiled pleasantly at Maki Gruter. “Anyone of any interest in this batch?”

“Not that I can see,” the civil servant said. “All Earth nationals. Usual Ivet types, waster kids dumb enough to get caught.
No political exiles, or at least, none listed.” Behind his head, the screen displaying the vectors of Lalonde’s miserly orbital
traffic showed another spaceplane docking with the vast colonist-carrier starship.

“Fine. I’ll have it checked, of course,” Ralph said expectantly.

“Oh, right.” Maki Gruter’s mouth twitched in a half-embarrassed grin. He pulled out a processor block and datavised the files
over.

Ralph observed the information flood into his neural nanonics, assigning it to spare storage cells. Tracer programs ran through
the fifty-five hundred names, comparing them to his primary list, the most troublesome of Earth’s political agitators known
to the ESA. There was no match-up. Later he would datavise the files into a processor block, running a comparison with the
huge catalogue of recidivist names, facial images, and in some cases DNA prints which the ESA had trawled from right across
the Confederation.

He glanced out through the window again to see a group of the new arrivals slogging along the mushy road which led down the
side of the square of grass and straggly roses which passed for the embassy gardens. The rain had arrived, drenching them
in seconds. Women, children, and men with their hair beaten down, jump suits clinging to their bodies like a dark, crinkled,
lizard hide, all looking thoroughly wretched. There might have been tears on their faces, but he couldn’t tell with the rain.
And they still had another three kilometres to go before they reached the transients’ dormitories down by the river.

“Christ, look at them,” he murmured. “And they’re supposed to be this planet’s hope for the future. They can’t even organize
a walk from the spaceport properly, none of them thought to take waterproofs.”

“Have you ever been to Earth?” Maki Gruter asked.

Ralph turned away from the window, surprised by the younger man’s question. Maki was normally keen to simply collect the money
and run. “No.”

“I have. That planet is one giant hive queen for misbegot-tens. Our noble past. Compared to that, what this planet offers
in the way of a future doesn’t look so bad.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Ralph opened a drawer and took out his Jovian Bank credit disk.

“There’s someone else going upriver with this batch of colonists,” Maki said. “My office had to arrange a berth for him, that’s
how I know.”

Ralph stopped in the act of authorizing the usual three-hundred-fuseodollar payment. “Who’s that?”

“A marshal from the Sheriff’s Office. Don’t know his name, but he’s being sent up to Schuster County to scout round.”

Ralph listened to Maki Gruter explain about the missing homestead families, his mind running over the implications. Somebody
in the Governor’s Office must consider it important, he thought, there were only five marshals on the planet: combat specialists
with nanonic-boosted metabolisms, and well armed. Colony Governors deployed them to sort out severe problems, like bandits
and potential revolts, problems that had to be eliminated fast.

Another of Ralph’s briefs was to watch for pirate activity in the Lalonde system. Prosperous Kulu with its large merchant
fleet was engaged in a constant battle with mercenary vessels. Undisciplined, under-policed colony planets with woefully deficient
communications were an ideal market for stolen cargoes, and most of the immigrants were at least bright enough to bring a
credit disk primed with fuseodol-lars. The contraband was invariably sold deep in the hinterlands, where dreams soured within
weeks when it became clear just how tough it was to survive outside the enclosed comfort of an arcology, and nobody was going
to question where sophisticated power hardware and medical packages came from.

Perhaps those families had questioned the source of their windfall?

“Thanks for telling me,” he said, and upped the payment to five hundred fuseodollars.

Maki Gruter smiled in gratitude as his credit disk registered the financial bonus. “My pleasure.”

Jenny Harris came in a minute after the transport manager left. A thirty-year-old ESA lieutenant, on her second off-world
mission. She had a flat face, her nose slightly crooked, with short dark ginger hair, and a slim figure which belied her strength.
Ralph had found her a competent officer in the two years she’d been on Lalonde, if a little bit too rigorous in applying agency
procedure to every situation.

She listened attentively as Ralph repeated what Maki Gruter had told him.

“I haven’t heard any word on unexplained hardware appearing upriver,” she said. “Just the usual black-market activity, selling
off the gear which the spaceport crews lift from new colonists.”

“What assets have we got up in the Schuster area?” “Few,” she said reluctantly. “We mainly rely on our contacts in the Sheriff’s
Office for reports on contraband, and the boat crews fill in a bit more of the picture. Communication is the problem, naturally.
We can give our upriver assets communication blocks, but the Confederation Navy satellites would spot any transmissions even
if they were prime encrypted.”

“OK,” Ralph nodded. It was an old argument, urgency against exposure risk. At this stage of its development nothing on Lalonde
was considered urgent. “Do we have anyone going upriver?”

Jenny Harris paused as her neural nanonics reviewed schedules. “Yes. Captain Lambourne is due to take a new colonist group
upriver in a couple of days, they’re settling land just past Schuster itself. She’s a good courier, I use her to collect reports
from our in situ assets.”

“Right, ask her to find out what she can, about the missing families and whether or not there’s been any unexplained equipment
appearing up there. In the meantime I’ll contact Solanki, see if he’s heard anything about it.” Kelven Solanki worked at the
small Confederation Navy office in Durringham. Confederation Navy policy was that even the humblest of colony worlds was entitled
to the same degree of protection as any of the developed planets, and the office was supposed to be visible proof of that.
To underline the fact, Lalonde received a twice-yearly visit by a frigate from the 7th Fleet, based at Roherheim, forty-two
light-years away. Between visits, a flock of ELINT sensor satellites watched over the star system, reporting their observations
directly to the navy office.

Like Ralph and the ESA, their secondary role was to keep an eye out for pirate activity.

Ralph had introduced himself to Lieutenant-Commander Solanki soon after he arrived. The Saldanas were strong supporters of
the Confederation, so cooperation as far as locating pirate activity was concerned was a sensible arrangement. He got on reasonably
well with the commander, partly due to the navy’s mess, which served arguably the best meals in the city, and neither of them
made any mention of Ralph’s other duties. “Good idea,” Jenny Harris said. “I’ll meet with Lam-bourne tonight, and brief her
on what we want. She’ll want paying,” she added in a cautionary tone.

Ralph requested Lambourne’s file from his neural nanon-ics, shaking his head ruefully when he saw how much the woman cost
them. He could guess how much she would ask for this fact-finding mission upriver. “OK, I’ll authorize it. Try and keep her
under a thousand, please.”

“Do my best.”

“Once you’ve dealt with her, I want you to activate an asset in the Governor’s office, find out why the Honourable Colin Rexrew
thinks it’s necessary to send a marshal to investigate some missing farmers no one has ever heard of before.”

After Jenny Harris left he datavised the list of new arrivals into his processor block for analysis, then sat back and thought
about how much to tell Commander Solanki. With a bit of luck he could drag out the meeting and get himself invited to dinner
at the mess.

Twenty-two thousand kilometres ahead of
Oenone
, the tiny blue ion-manoeuvring jets of the Adamist starship
Dymasio
were consumed by the interstellar night. Syrinx watched through the voidhawk’s optical senses as the intense pinprick of
light dwindled away to nothing. Directional vectors swirled away at the back of her mind, an unconscious calculation performed
in conjunction with
Oenone
’s spacial instinct. The
Dymasio
had lined up on the Honeck star system eight light-years away, the alignment checked out perfectly.

I think this is it,
she told Thetis.
Graeae
, her brother’s voidhawk, was drifting a thousand kilometres to one side of
Oenone
; the two voidhawks had their distortion fields reduced to a minimum. They were operating in full stealth mode, with minimal
energy expenditure. There wasn’t even any gravity in the crew toroid. The crew hadn’t eaten any hot meals, there had been
no waste dumps, all of them peeing and crapping into sanitary bags, and there was definitely no hot water. Blanket webs of
heat-duct cables had been laid over
Oenone
’s hull and crew toroid alike, then smothered by a thick light-absorbent insulation foam. All the starship’s waste heat was
siphoned off by the blankets and radiated away through a single dump panel, always orientated away from their prey. Holes
had been left for
Oenone
’s sensor blisters, but that was all.
Oenone
kept complaining that the covering itched, which was ridiculous, but Syrinx held her peace—for now.

I agree,
Thetis replied.

Syrinx felt a shiver of trepidation mingling with a release of pent-up tension. They had been following the
Dymasio
for seventeen days, keeping twenty to thirty thousand kilometres behind as it zigzagged between uninhabited star systems
on a totally random course designed to spot and shake off any possible pursuer. A chase of that nature was demanding and difficult,
putting a strain on even Edenist psyches, let alone the twenty-strong Adamist naval marine squad they were carrying. Seeing
the way their hard-pressed captain, Larry Kouritz, had maintained discipline throughout the mission had sparked a rare respect.
And there weren’t many Adamists who rated that.

With the final coordinate insertion manoeuvres complete, she could imagine the
Dymasio
retracting its sensors and thermo-dump panels, configuring itself for the jump, charging its patterning nodes with energy.
Ready?
she asked
Oenone
.

I’m always ready,
the voidhawk replied tartly.

Yes, she would be very glad when this mission was over.

It had been Thetis who persuaded her to sign on with the Confederation Navy for a seven-year tour, Thetis with his strong
sense of duty and commitment, goaded by a wilful zest. Syrinx had always intended to put in a naval stint, Athene had often
told her rumbustious children of her service days, painting an enticing picture of gallantry and camaraderie. She just hadn’t
anticipated it to be quite so soon, three years after she and
Oenone
started flying.

With their power and agility, voidhawks were an essential component of the Confederation Navy, employed by Fleet admirals
as ideal interception craft. After being fitted out with both offensive and defensive combat systems and an extensive array
of electronic sensors, then undergoing a three-month procedural-training course,
Oenone
and
Graeae
had been assigned to the 4th Fleet, operating from the Japanese Imperium capital Oshanko.

Although the Confederation Navy was a dedicated supranational organization, voidhawks always had Edenist crews. Syrinx had
kept her original crew: Cacus, the life-support engineer; Edwin, in charge of the toroid’s mechanical and electrical systems;
Oxley, who piloted both the multifunction service vehicle and the atmospheric ion-field flyer; Tula, the ship’s generalist
and medical officer. And Ruben, the fusion-generator technician, who had become Syrinx’s lover a month after he came aboard,
and at a hundred and twenty-five was exactly a century older than her.

It was like Aulie all over again, an aspect which made her feel incredibly girlish and carefree, almost an antithesis of her
responsibilities as captain. They slept together when ship’s schedules permitted, and spent all their shore leave ranging
across whichever planet, habitat, or asteroid settlement they were visiting. Although well into middle age, Ruben, like all
Edenists, was still more than capable physically, so their sex life was pretty reasonable; and they both shared a delight
in exploring the different cultures flourishing within the Confederation, marvelling in their sheer variety. Through Ruben,
and his seemingly inexhaustible patience, she had learned to be far more tolerant of Adamists and their idiosyncrasies. Which
was another reason for accepting the Confederation Navy commission.

Then there was also that familiar miscreant thrill to be had from the way everyone regarded their relationship as mildly scandalous.
Given their life expectancy, large age gaps were common among Edenist partners, but a hundred years was pushing the limits
of propriety. Only Athene didn’t make the mistake of objecting, she knew Syrinx far too well for that. In any case, the relationship
wasn’t that serious; Ruben was convenient, uncomplicated, and fun.

The final crew-member was Chi, who had been posted to
Oenone
by the navy to be their weapons officer. He was a career Confederation Navy man, as far as any Edenist could be in an organization
which demanded staff officers renounce their national citizenship (hardly practical for Edenists).