In Enemy Hands

Despite the size of some of the programs and program groups involved, the substitutions flicked into place with a speed which would have been inconceivable to anyone who'd lived in the days of chips and printed circuits, and the breath Harkness hadn't realized he was holding whooshed out as confirmation of his commands' execution blinked on his display. Then he logged off, pulled the minicomp out of its slot, shoved it into his pocket, slung the laundry bag with Johnson's uniform over his shoulder, and walked quickly to the end of the compartment. The ventilation grille would be a tight fit, but that was the least of his worries at the moment.

Warner Caslet squared his shoulders and straightened his spine as the lift stopped and the doors slid open. The last four weeks had been even worse than he'd expected, less because of any active unpleasantness than because of his complete impotence. He'd known exactly what was going to happen to Honor Harrington and her people, and there'd been no more he could do about that than there'd been anything he could do about whatever Cordelia Ransom intended to do with him. He was a bit surprised, when he thought about it, that she'd been content to leave her "military liaison" with the prisoners alone for so long, though that might have been because he'd underestimated her intelligence. Perhaps she'd simply realized that the longer she kept the Sword of Damocles suspended above his head, the worse it would hurt when she finally let it fall and proved any hope he'd allowed himself to feel was only an illusion.

But whatever else might be about to happen, Tepes was about to cross the perimeter of the satellites protecting the planet Hades. In fact, she was little more than half an hour out of parking orbit, though he wasn't really supposed to know that. He didn't quite understand the point in trying to conceal it from him, unless it was simply part of StateSec's mania for keeping everything to itself, but it hadn't proved particularly difficult to discover anyway. And because he knew what was about to happen, he'd decided to pay another visit to Alistair McKeon and Andreas Venizelos.

He shouldn't do it, of course. He'd been brought along specifically to take official responsibility for the prisoners' condition, but deliberately seeking additional contact with them only chipped away at whatever tiny chance of survival he might still have. He knew that, but he couldn't help himself.

Despite his official status, he'd been unable to gain access to Lady Harrington, who, after all, wasn't a military prisoner... officially, and his single attempt to ferret out a report on her condition had met with a rebuff so savage that he hadn't dared to pursue it. But he had been able to get in to see the people who were still considered military POWs virtually at will. Perhaps that was because he hadn't asked permission; he'd simply taken advantage of his rank and "liaison" duties to bulldoze his way past the StateSec lieutenant responsible for them. He hadn't really expected to get away with it, but apparently the lieutenant hadn't reported his visits to higher authority, unless, of course, said higher authority had decided to give him enough rope for a suitable noose and use the security cameras to record the proof of his apostasy. After all, what legitimate reason could an officer of the PRH have for hobnobbing with captured enemies of the People any more than his official responsibilities absolutely demanded? No doubt the HD chips would prove useful at his trial... assuming anyone bothered to give him one.

Now he stepped through the lift doors and nodded curtly to the four guards at the security console halfway down the passage. The StateSec troopers looked up in alarm, straightening their spines and setting down illicit coffee cups, then relaxed as they saw it was only Caslet. Even disregarding whatever the rumor mill suggested might or might not happen to him down the road, he was merely a naval officer, and the duty watch sergeant waved for the others to stay put as he strolled down the passage to greet the visitor.

"What can I do for you, Citizen Commander?" he asked without bothering to salute.

"I'd like to speak with the senior prisoners, Citizen Sergeant I

"No skin off my nose," he grunted, and waved an arm to bring one of the other three over as he turned to lead the way to the locked hatch. The woman behind the desk answered his gesture, unracked a flechette gun, and crossed to stand five feet back, covering the hatch, and only then did the sergeant input the door lock's combination.

"Look alive, Manties!" he shouted through the opening hatch. "You got a visitor."

The compartment lighting came up as the hatch opened, and Caslet felt a twinge of guilt as sleepy men sat up in their bunks. It was the middle of the night by Tepes' clocks, but if he'd waited till morning, they would have been gone before he could see them.

He nodded to the sergeant once more and stepped into the compartment so that I

The first time he'd come to visit these men, their welcome had been frigid. He hadn't blamed them for that. Indeed, he'd expected it to be even worse, but that was because he hadn't known "Colonel" LaFollet was in the same compartment. Lady Harrington's armsman had recognized him and introduced him to the others, and the way LaFollet had done it had told them this Peep was different. By now, Caslet had actually formed a tenuous friendship with McKeon. Venizelos remained more suspicious, but like McKeon, and, especially, LaFollet and Montoya, he'd been too grateful for Caslet’s efforts to obtain additional medical supplies for Nimitz to maintain any active hostility.

Thoughts of the treecat carried Caslet across the compartment towards LaFollet’s bunk, and his heart twisted with familiar distress as Nimitz struggled up in the nest of blankets at its foot to greet him. Treecats' bones knitted more rapidly than human bones, but no one in Tepes' crew had been interested in providing the tools Montoya would have required to repair Nimitz's injuries properly. The 'cat had regained much of his strength, but his shattered midshoulder and arm were twisted and crippled, "healed" in the merely approximate positions Montoya had been able to manage. The injury had robbed him of his normal, flowing grace, and the pain in his eyes and half-flattened ears as he made himself move was grievous to behold, but the 'cat refused to let self-pity rule him. Now he pushed himself into an almost fully upright position, listing slightly to the right as his crippled side dragged at his balance, and bleeked a welcome to Caslet.

The fact that Nimitz liked and trusted him had been the real final element in the human prisoners' acceptance of him, Caslet knew, and he ran one hand gently over the 'cat's head, then turned to face McKeon.

"I'm sorry to wake you, Captain," he said quietly, "but I thought you should know. We'll be entering Hades orbit within forty minutes." McKeon stiffened, and Caslet felt the same ripple of tension spread out across the compartment. "Shipboard time isn't quite synchronized with local," he went on, "but it'll be light at Camp Charon in about another two hours, and they'll be taking you down then. I... thought you'd like to know."

Harkness made a final turn, then stopped, resting flat on his belly, and pulled the minicomp out. The displays moving window was centered on a single portion of the ventilation and maintenance schematic he'd copied from the Engineering subsystem, and he tapped a key, zooming in on the window. The scale shifted, showing him his present surroundings in considerably more detail, and he grunted in satisfaction.