Wolf Among the Stars-ARC Read online

  At least the problem gave them something to think about besides the Kappainu ships shadowing them.

  Repeating the trick Broadsword had played was, of course, out of the question. City of Osaka, with her two pathetic point-defense lasers, was no strike cruiser. If she suddenly transitioned out of overspace, her pursuers would simply follow her into normal space, where she would be at their doubtless extremely limited mercy.

  “Of course,” said Andrew as he, Reislon, and Alana Morales sat glumly at a wardroom table discussing the hopelessness of that option, “if we did so somewhere short of Kogurche, at least we wouldn’t be revealing to them the location of the Rogovon rebel fleet.”

  Moraless’ dark eyes flashed. She had been told everything and had more or less adjusted to the fact that there were Rogovon who must be treated as allies, but there were limits. She glanced at Reislon, then immediately looked away, but not before the Lokar noticed.

  “Actually,” said Reislon evenly, “I would advise against that. This ship’s destruction or capture would simply mean that everything we’ve learned so far would go for naught and the Kappainu would be free to proceed with their plans, with all that implies for both our races—including the Rogovon revolutionary movement. No, our only alternative is to stay the course, in the hope that help will be waiting in the Kogurche system. Remember, Borthru proceeded directly there in Trovyr, and has presumably been there for some time.”

  “Very well,” Andrew decided. “We’ll make transition in a region that’s not right on top of your people’s base but close enough to it to offer some hope that its being patrolled. And we’ll start broadcasting a distress signal on their special band as soon as we’re in normal space.”

  They came out of overspace in the gravitational hinterlands between the two Kogurche suns. Their pursuers appeared astern, at a range so short as to earn Andrew’s grudging respect for their precision.

  “They’re not even bothering to cloak themselves,” said Morales.

  Why should they? thought Andrew. Aloud: “Get the distress signal out.”

  “Already done, sir.” Morales, Andrew decided, should set that to music.

  “They also are not troubling with a surrender demand,” said Reislon as missiles, launched at extreme range, appeared on the tactical plot.

  “Evasive action,” Andrew ordered. There wasn’t much else he could do, as they were already at general quarters. So he studied the sensor readouts on the Kappainu warships, which he had never had a chance to observe uncloaked before. They were no more than frigate-sized, which came as no surprise; the hidden Kappainu space station, huge as it was, could hardly have accommodated anything larger in significant nymbers. So they wouldn’t be carrying fighters. They were actually less massive than City of Osaka . . . but they were warriorsn and it was a drone.

  Still, he didn’t think much of their tactics. He himself would have waited and gotten in closer before launching missiles—assuming that the Kappainu could endure extended high accelerations, which they probably could since the artificial gravity in their station had seemed to be roughly Earth normal. The missiles’ lengthy flight time allowed his defensive lasers plenty of time for targeting solutions, and they did themselves proud once the missiles came within their limited range.

  But it was not enough. Some missiles got close enough to detonate. City of Osaka’s deflection shields could not cope with that concentration of directed energy, and she shuddered and lurched under repeated hits.

  “The lasers’ fire-control electronics are fried, sir,” Morales reported calmly. “And the deflection shields—”

  “I see, Lieutenant,” said Andrew. No way out, he forced himself not to add as he stared at the two scarlet blips of their tormentors, which would now undoubtedly close to the range of ship-to-ship lasers rather than wasting any more missiles . . .

  And as he watched, those blips went out.

  “What—?” he heard Morales gasp.

  “It appears,” said Reislon from his ill-fitting acceleration couch, “that they have gone into cloak and ceased all weapon fire, which would reveal their position.”

  “And I see why,” said Andrew as an entire formation of blips began to appear on the outer edges of the scanner screen.

  “They could still have gotten us, sir,” said Morales. “They had time, just barely, before those ships could come in range—”

  “—And obliterate them,” Andrew finished for her. “Yes, they could have done it . . . if they’d been willing to sacrifice themselves. But, as I’m coming to understand, that’s not the Kappainu way. Which,” he concluded thoughtfully, “is what may save us yet.”

  “We’re being hailed, sir,” said the communication officer. And the screen came to life, revealing a Lokaron face of the green-skinned, relatively thick-featured variety.

  “Borthru!” Andrew exclaimed.

  Off to the side, Morales sighed, “I never thought I’d be so glad to see a face like that.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  “How did you locate us so quickly?” Andrew asked as Borthru’s ships formed a protective englobement around City of Osaka, just in case. “Not that I’m complaining, mind you.”

  “When Broadsword failed to follow us here, we feared the worst,” Borthru explained. “We have been conducting intensive patrolling ever since. Some among us have been arguing for its discontinuance, saying all hope is gone. It is fortunate that you arrived no later than you did. But where is Broadsword?”

  “She may or may not be following us, so please keep up your patrols for now. I’ll explain why later. We have a lot of news, most of which you won’t like—so much that I don’t want to have to repeat it all twice. For now, let me just tell you that we have a device like the Cydonia artifact aboard this ship, but that it’s going to require Zhygon and his team to get it out.”

  “I’ll signal ahead. And now, let us proceed to the base. I’ll do my best to contain my curiosity until our arrival.” Borthru signed off.

  “All right, X.O., make formation with our allies,” Andrew told Morales.

  “Aye, aye, sir.” The young lieutenant’s unease was palpable as she cast glances at the Rogovon ships in the viewscreen, but she carried out her orders with her usual emotionless efficiency.

  Andrew drew her aside and spoke privately. “Alana, when we arrive at our destination a Rogovon scientist named Zhygon’Trogak and his assistants are going to come aboard and extract the access key. You will cooperate with them to the fullest. Understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Now, we’re going to be docking at a space habitat, or collection of habitats, full of Rogovon. I imagine you and your crew will be most comfortable remaining on this ship during our stay.”

  Morales’s lips quirked upward in the closest thing to a smile he had yet seen on her. “That’s one way to put it, sir.”

  “All right. Here’s something to occupy your time. I want you to start working on your human prisoners—the original Black Wolf crew. Take them one at a time, as is standard interrogation technique. Show them the evidence that they‘ve been pawns of aliens and see if you can turn any of them. Some of them may have information we can use.”

  “Aye, aye, sir. Of course, you realize I’m not an Intelligence specialist.”

  “No, but as I’ve found out, you’re damned intelligent. Close enough.”

  Andrew had never realized how comforting Rachel’s presence had been when he had first been among the Rogovon revolutionaries. It had prevented him from being the only human around, as he now was as he sat at a conference table otherwise occupied by Borthru, Zhygon, three of the principal leaders of the revolutionary coalition . . . and Reislon, who barely even seemed like an alien any more.

  He was hoarse from talking for hours. Fortunately, one of the few luxury items the revolutionaries possessed was coffee—a lucrative export item for Earth, for caffeine, like alcohol, affected the Lokaron and human nervous systems similarly. He appreciated their generosit
y in letting him keep himself awake with it as he and Reislon recounted the entire, incredible story. He doubted his Rogovon listeners would have believed him without Reislon’s corroboration.

  Now there was an appalled silence. Andrew started to reach for his awkward Lokaron-designed coffee cup again, but thought better of it. It wouldn’t do to have to ask to be excused at some crucial point in the discussion.

  Kostov’Zhythog, who appeared to be primus inter pares in the revolutionary leadership, finally broke the silence. He was a transmitter, as were his colleagues Vrontu’Torath and Gorova’Suvak, which was no surprise; the Rogovon were considered socially backward by the other Lokaron, and even their radicals had old-fashioned attitudes concerning gender roles. He also showed all the indicia of old age. But he had listened alertly. Now he shook himself in a way that Andrew recognized as a characteristic bit of Lokaron body language, denoting a wish to wake up from a nightmare known to be real.

  “So,” Kostov said heavily, “this is to be the destiny of Gev-Rogov: the instigator of a war that will bring all the Lokaron societies—including, in the end, itself—down in ruins, leaving a rubble heap ruled by these Kappainu, acting through—” He glanced at Andrew and stopped himself short of saying something tactless.

  “But the Kappainu may be wrong,” said Gorova’Suvak, leader of a moderate faction and a vacillator by nature. “Maybe their plan will fail in the long run.”

  “In the short run, however, it calls for our movement’s failure,” Reislon reminded him.

  “Which makes you and we humans natural allies,” Andrew added.

  “But we can’t trust the CNE government,” declared Vrontu’Torath. He headed a hard-line faction, and Andrew had found him the toughest nut to crack. “It has obviously been infiltrated, we don’t know how deeply. And even if it hadn’t been, it wouldn’t trust us.”

  “Probably true,” Andrew admitted. “Which is why I don’t propose that we involve the CNE. And it goes without saying that you can’t approach the Gev-Rogov government. So . . . I suggest that we deal with the problem ourselves.”

  For a moment, Andrew permitted himself to savor the sensation of, for once, having left even Reislon thunderstruck. Then he hurried on before his listeners could recover.

  “The Kappainu space station is in the dark outer reaches of the Sol system where their invisibility technology is practically redundant. Even without it, they’d be noticed only by a wild chance, especially considering that they’re well outside the plane of the ecliptic, which is all anyone ever pays attention to. Entirely consistent with their psychology, of course—they’re hyper-cautious by nature. But in this case their caution is self-defeating. Your fleet can go there and make transition from overspace unobserved. The CNE doesn’t even have to know about the operation.”

  Vrontu made noises that the translator ignored, before finally managing to form words. “But what if we fail? You’re asking us to risk our carefully husbanded military resources on a mission that has nothing to do with our organization’s reason for existence: the liberation of Gev-Rogov. No—our duty is to Gev-Rogov, not to humans!”

  “I remind you,” said Reislon, “that the Kappainu are committed to keeping the present regime in place in Gev-Rogov. It is integral to their plan. We will never succeed in overthrowing it unless their power is broken.”

  “Reislon is right,” said Borthru abruptly. “This is our fight, too. And besides . . . it has been altogether too long since we have been offered a bold plan of action.” He turned to Andrew and gave a classic Lokaron smile—the smile of a race of omnivores tending to a more carnivorous orientation than that of Homo sapiens. Then he faced his political leaders again. “It’s too bad that we had to have it offered to us by a human. But that’s our fault, not his.”

  There was an uneasy silence. Andrew knew the pitfalls of trying to deduce the political nuances of nonhumans, but he sensed that in this assemblage Borthru spoke for the younger Rogovon military officers among the revolutionaries, who had been kept straining at the leash for too long.

  Gorova, ever the voice of caution, spoke hesitantly. “But even if we break them in the Sol system, they may just fall back to their home system—regarding whose location we have no clue—and try again.”

  “Still,” Borthru urged, “it would be a major setback for them. They would have to start over from scratch, rebuilding a structure of infiltration that took decades. This would give us time to carry out our plans. After the revolution, with a new Rogovon regime that knows all about them, their scheme will no longer be viable.”

  “At the same time,” Reislon mused, “It would be highly desirable to obtain more facts about them—notably the location of their home planet—so we could attack the problem at its source.”

  “Yes.” Andrew spoke decisively, for Reislon had given him an opening. “Also, we need irrefutable evidence to persuade the CNE government to adopt all-out antiKappainu security measures: biological scans of all its personnel, and so forth. I therefore propose that we not destroy the station—at least not until we’ve had a chance to penetrate it. Also,” he continued, trying to make it sound like an afterthought, “they have a human prisoner, whose testimony would be useful.”

  “Ah, yes, Ms. Arnstein,” said Reislon. Andrew knew what a Lokaron smile looked like, but this was the first time he had seen one being smoothed out. “Yes, I suppose it would be desirable to recover her alive . . . for debriefing.”

  “Er . . . ahem . . . yes, precisely. Debriefing.”

  “But,” demanded Vrontu, on whom the byplay was lost, “how can we penetrate the station?”

  “I have an idea for that. Remember, we have an access key and therefore can detect the station and communicate with it. Zhygon, you’ve had time to study the thing. Can you replicate it?”

  “Yes,” said the old scientist unequivocally. “In reverse-engineering an unfamiliar device, knowing exactly what it is intended to do is half the battle. It also helps that, as you have pointed out, the overall Kappainu technology is no more advanced than ours; this is just an application of it that has never occurred to us. Our facilities here are up to producing a fair quantity of comparable units—not as compact and elegant as the original, but quite functional, and adapted to installation on our ships. The greatest problem was figuring out the controls by trial and error.”

  “Can you rig an auxiliary control board for the one from City of Osaka that will be usable by humans?”

  “I should think so, with the help of your technicians.”

  “Good.” Andrew turned back to the others. “So your ships will be able to detect the station. And as I’ve explained, the cloaking system their ships use is relatively elementary; detecting them should be easy. Knowing them, I suspect that finding out that they’re in full view of their enemies will shatter their morale.”

  “You still haven’t explained how you think it will be possible to simply walk into the station,” Vrontu persisted.

  “What makes it possible is that we have a ship—City of Osaka—of a type used by the Black Wolf Society, whose human personnel they are accustomed to employing. Also . . . I have an officer who should be able to play a useful role.”

  “Sit down, X.O.,” said Andrew as Lieutenant Morales entered his cabin aboard City of Osaka.

  “Thank you, sir.” She lowered her compact body—no more than five feet two but well-proportioned for its height—into a chair. She looked more Castilian than anything else, but with a hint of high Indian cheekbones and a slightly dusky skin tone that suggested African genes.

  “So, how is it going with our guests?”

  “Difficult, sir. It seems the Black Wolf Society has a very strict code of silence, and even my promises of protection against vengeance haven’t budged most of them. And they think what we’ve told them about the Black Wolf being under the control of shape-shifting aliens is an elaborate lie. There are a few, however, who’ve revealed flexibility, and I’ve made some progress with them—thanks t
o Zhygon.”

  “Zhygon?” Andrew’s eyebrows rose.

  “Yes, sir. He’s kept the body of ‘Amletto Leong’ in cryo suspension. He let us show it to the ones we thought might be open to influence. It made an impression. But there’s only one of them I really think is worth any further effort. And he’d be a good catch; he was pretty high-ranking and was involved with communications.”

  “I’m very glad to hear that. You see, I have a plan, for which it sounds like he can be very useful. And so can you.”

  “Me, sir?”

  “I believe so. But first, let me ask you something. Did Da Sliva, the Kappainu captain of this ship, ever see you while we had him as a prisoner?”

  “No, sir.” Morales was obviously puzzled by the question. “He was brought aboard Broadsword just before I was sent over with the prize crew. We never met.”

  “Good.” Andrew leaned forward and spoke carefully. “Alana, I’m sure you’re already aware that you happen to bear a certain physical resemblance to the type of human form that the Kappainu assume when they shape-shift.”

  “Yes, sir. That was one of the things that Captain Taylor explained to us aboard Broadsword before we left the Sol system. Some of my so-called friends kidded me about it. Thank God for medical scanners!”

  Andrew’s expression stayed serious. “Well, this is why you can be uniquely useful—if, and only if, you choose to. You see, my plan is this.” He proceeded to set forth his idea, and her part in it, concluding: “I want you to understand, Alana, that this is strictly on a volunteer basis—a real volunteer basis, by which I mean that if you say no, this conversation never took place. I cannot order you to hazard yourself on a long chance like this.”