The Sundering (6 page)

Sula took in another breath, and Martinez realized his own breath was synchronous with hers. For he, too, was living through hard gee, and he as well was strapped into an acceleration couch, his body confined in a pressure suit.

It was impossible to share each other’s company, he thought, but at least we can share our misery.

Sula breathed again, and for a brief moment Martinez saw mischief flare in her weary eyes. “We had a discussion about censorship in the mess the other day, and about why the government has been suppressing what happened at Magaria. I suggested that the point of censorship isn’t to hide certain facts but to keep the wrong people from finding them out. If the majority knew the true facts, they would begin to act as their self-interest dictates, and not
enlightened
self-interest either. If they’re kept in ignorance they’ll be much more inclined to act as the self-interest of others dictates.” She gasped in air. “One of our officers—won’t mention names here—said the whole point is to prevent civilians from panicking. But I think it’s what happens
after
people panic that should frighten us. We should be scared of what happens when people stop panicking and start to
think.
” Sula gave an intense green-eyed look to the camera. “I wonder what
you
think about such things.”

She allowed herself a morbid smile. “I also wonder if your old friend Lieutenant Foote is going to let you see any of this, particularly my speculations on the nature and purpose of information control. But I suppose if he chops any of this, it will only prove my point.” Her smile broadened. “I’ll look forward to hearing from you. Let me know how your next exercise turns out.”

The orange End Transmission symbol appeared on the screen. Apparently Foote had tried to disprove Sula’s argument by not cutting any of the message.

Clever Sula, Martinez thought.

Martinez saved the message to his private file as he thought about censorship. It had always been there, and he’d never spent a lot of time thinking about it except when it intruded on his time, as when he was ordered to censor the pulpies’ mail.

As for official censorship, he’d always thought of it as a kind of game between the censors and himself. They’d try to hide something, and he’d try to read behind the censors’ words to find out what had really happened. From an exhortation to Unceasingly Labor at Public Works, it was possible to conclude that a major building project had fallen behind schedule; likewise, a news item praising emergency services often implied a disaster at which emergency services had been employed, but which was too embarrassing for those in charge to admit. An item praising certain ministers could be a tacit criticism of those ministers who were not mentioned, or a criticism of one junior minister could in reality be a disguised assault on his more senior patron.

Reading behind the news was a game at which Martinez had grown expert. But unlike Sula he’d never thought of censorship having a
purpose,
in part because it seemed too arbitrary for that. What was cut, and what permitted, was so capricious as to seem almost stochastic: sometimes he wondered if the censors were amusing themselves by cutting every sentence with an irregular verb, or any news item in which appeared the word “sun.”

Sula’s notion that censorship was aimed at giving certain people a monopoly on the truth was new to him. But who
were
these people? He didn’t know anyone who didn’t have to deal with the censorship—even when he’d worked on the staff of Fleet Commander Enderby, he’d discovered that Enderby’s public pronouncements had to be reviewed by the censors.

Possibly
nobody
knew what was really happening. Martinez found that more frightening than Sula’s theory of a conspiracy of elites.

It would have been hard, for example, to work into any theory of censorship the conversation he’d had the previous day with Dalkeith. They’d had a breakfast meeting about ordinary ship business, and at the end, over coffee, she’d given him a puzzled look, as if she didn’t know where to begin, and then said, “You know I’m censoring the other lieutenants’ mail.”

Censorship, like all tasks that no one really wanted, was a job that tended to fall quickly down the ladder of seniority. The most junior cadets censored the messages of the enlisted; and the most junior lieutenant censored the cadets. Dalkeith censored the two lieutenants junior to her, and Martinez was left free of all responsibility but that of reviewing her messages only—a light task, as they consisted entirely of dull but heartfelt greetings to her family back on Zarafan.

“Yes?” Martinez prompted. “Is there a problem?”

“Not a problem, exactly.” Dalkeith lips twisted, as if searching for an entry point to this subject. “You know Vonderheydte has a lady friend on Zanshaa. Her name is Lady Mary.”

“Is it? I didn’t know.” He rather doubted that the lady’s name was of any great relevance.

“Vonderheydte and Lady Mary exchange videos, and the videos are of a…” She hesitated. “…highly libidinous nature. They exchange fantasies and, ah, attempt to enact them for the camera.”

Martinez reached for his coffee. “You haven’t encountered this before?” he said. “I’m surprised.” When he was a fresh young cadet aboard ship for the first time, he had been deeply shocked by both the ingenuity and depravity of the holejumpers whose messages he’d been called on to review. By the end of the second month of this involuntary course in human nature, he’d become a cynical, hard-boiled tough, a walking encyclopedia of degeneracy, incapable of being surprised by any iniquity, no matter how appalling.

“It’s not that,” Dalkeith said. “I just wonder at the
persistence.
They spend
hours
at it, and it’s all very elaborate and imaginative. I don’t know where Vonderheydte gets the energy, considering we’re under acceleration.” Her troubled eyes gazed into his. “There’s a relentless quality to it that seems unhealthy to me. You don’t suppose he’s doing himself actual physical harm, do you?”

Martinez put down his coffee cup and paged through the mental encyclopedia of depravity he’d acquired as a cadet. “He’s not getting involved in, ah, asphyxiation?”

Dalkeith shook her head.

“Or use of ligatures? Around, say, vital parts?”

Dalkeith seemed dubious. “Depends on how vital you consider hands and feet. Well, one hand actually.” She looked at him. “Would you like to see the next set of outgoing messages?”

Martinez explained to his senior lieutenant that, however much she failed to enjoy watching a young man engage in acts of self-stimulation, he would enjoy it even less.

“I don’t care what he’s doing so long as it’s on his own time, and so long as he remains undamaged,” Martinez said. And then he added, “You can fast-forward through it, you know. I very much doubt Vonderheydte is giving away state secrets during these interludes. Or you can have the computer make a transcript and review that.”

Dalkeith sighed. “Very well, my lord.”

Cheer up, he thought, the reading might be more fun than the watching. All fantasy, without the reality of Vonderheydte’s contortions.

After that conversation, the rest of ship’s business had seemed very dull.

A chime on the comm interrupted Martinez’s remembrance. He answered, and heard Vonderheydte’s voice through his earphones.

“Personal transmission from the squadcom, my lord.”

Since the revelations of the previous morning, Martinez had found that Vonderheydte’s voice, even carrying a perfectly innocent message, seemed filled with libidinous suggestion. The dread scepter of the squadcom that hovered over his head, however, drove all suggestive notions out of Martinez’s head. His imagination flashed ahead to a rebuke, as
Corona
had once again fumbled in the morning’s maneuver.

“I’ll accept.” And as Do-faq’s head blossomed on the display, he said, “This is Captain Martinez, my lord.”

Peg teeth clacked in Do-faq’s muzzle. “I have received an order from the Commandery, lord captain. Your squadron is to increase acceleration, part company from the heavy squadron, enter the Hone-bar system ahead of us, and return to Zanshaa at the fastest possible speed.”

“Very good, my lord.” In truth, Martinez had been anticipating this order for some time. No enemy were expected at Hone-bar, and every ship in Faqforce was badly needed back at the capital. He had considered suggesting the separation himself, but held back for fear of being accused of being greedy for an independent command…that, and the fact that by now he quailed from the very idea of harder accelerations.

“You will commence at once,” Do-faq continued. “Your official orders will follow as soon as my secretary can copy them. I wish you the best of luck.”

“Thank you, my lord.”

Do-faq’s golden eyes softened. “I want you to know, Captain Martinez, that I have no regrets in regard to choosing you for command of the squadron.”

Martinez’s heart gave a spasm. “Thank you, lord squadcom.” He felt the millstone of doubt, heavy as a couple gravities’ acceleration, float weightless from his shoulders.

“You’ve been handicapped by an inexperienced crew, but they are improving under your direction, and I have no doubt they’ll prove as fine as any in the Fleet, in time.”

Gratitude threatened to overwhelm Martinez’s tongue, but he managed to say, “Thank you for your confidence, my lord. It has been a privilege to serve under you.” Another matter entered his mind, and he cleared his throat. “My lord,” he began, “perhaps you will recall our tactical discussion the other day. When I…suggested some rather unformed ideas regarding fleet tactics.”

Do-faq’s expression was unreadable. “Yes, lord captain,” he said, “I recall the discussion.”

“Well, the ideas have grown more, ah, formed.”

Briefly, he explained the attempt to encapsule the new formations within a bit of elegant mathematics. “That was Lieutenant Shankaracharya’s particular contribution,” he said.

Do-faq’s answer was instant. “You shared the data from Magaria with your lieutenants?”

“Ah—yes, lord squadcom.”

“I very much doubt the wisdom of this. Our superiors have decided that this information must be controlled.”

Which
superiors? As Sula’s theory flashed into Martinez’s mind.

“My lieutenants are reliable people, my lord,” he said.
Best not mention Alikhan.
“I have every confidence in their discretion.”

“They may be disheartened. They may spread defeatism.”

But everyone
knows
we got thrashed at Magaria, Martinez wanted to say. But instead he said, “The news seemed to inspire them to greater efforts, my lord. They know how critical our work could be to the outcome of the war.”

Do-faq’s golden eyes probed at him for a long moment. “Well, it’s too late now,” he decided. “I trust you will caution your officers not to go about spreading rumors.”

“Of course, my lord.” He hesitated. “Would you like to see the formula and an analysis, my lord? There are some unexpected conclusions.”

Not least of which was that the effective range of a warship’s missiles were considerably less than anyone had expected. Even Shankaracharya had confidently predicted that the missiles would have a much greater range than ships’ defensive armament; but analysis of the fighting at Magaria showed that while a ship could of course launch a missile at long range, a longer flight time only gave a target’s defenses a longer time to track the missile and shoot it down. The missiles that had the greatest chance of doing damage tended to be fired in swarms from fairly close range, and launched behind a screen of exploding antimatter missiles that confused enemy sensors.

“Send the analysis, by all means,” Do-faq said. “I’ll review it with my tactical officer.”

“Very good, my lord.”

Martinez briefly reviewed the analysis he’d prepared for Do-faq, gnawed his lip over the phrasing of the analysis, and then sent it personal to the squadron commander just as the tone sounded for reduced gees. His acceleration cage creaked as the gravities came off, and the soft pressure of his suit relaxed its grip on his arms and legs. He felt his chest expand, the sensation of relief and relaxation in his diaphragm, as he snapped up the faceplate and tasted the control room’s cool, sterile air.

There would be a twenty-six minute bathroom, recreation, and snack break at one gravity, then renewed acceleration at high gee. And a higher gee than anyone else knew.

“Vonderheydte,” Martinez said.

“Yes, my lord.”

“General message to the squadron. Inform them that we have received orders to accelerate ahead of the heavy squadron and return to Zanshaa. Tell them we shall accelerate to three point two gravities once the current break has ended, at 19:26.”

The brief hesitation in reply told of Vonderheydte’s dismay. “Very good, my lord.”

Heavier gees should take the zest out of Vonderheydte’s fantasy life, Martinez reflected, and he unlocked the cage’s displays and pushed them above his head and out of the way. Then he tipped the cage forward till his boots touched the floor, and he released the webbing and stood.

Blood swirled uneasily in his head, and he kept a hand clamped on the cage tubing until the vertigo eased.

He’d have some water, perhaps, or juice. And more meds to help endure the upcoming acceleration.

From this point on, he thought, the joy of command was going to be considerably reduced.

It was reduced by a larger margin four hours later, during the supper break, when a call came from Captain Kamarullah, personal to Martinez. Martinez answered it in his office, where he was nibbling a sandwich while catching up on
Corona
’s administrative work. Around the desk, towering in special racks to brace them against hard accelerations, were the two Home Fleet Trophies won by Captain Tarafah’s football teams, plus a second-place trophy and various prizes won by Tarafah in other commands.

Martinez wasn’t after trophies himself. If he could just get through tomorrow’s maneuvers without a visit from Mr. Calamity, he’d be satisfied.