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Chapter Twenty-Five
Helen Zilwicki swallowed hard. She was glad her skinsuit's helmet at least partially concealed her expression from the pi
She turned her head, glancing at the midshipman seated to her left. She would have preferred being paired with Leo Stottmeister, since neither Aikawa nor Ragnhild were available, but she hadn't been consulted. Commander FitzGerald had simply looked at the three middies still aboard Hexapuma , then jabbed with a forefinger, assigning Leo to his pi
"It's going to be bad over there," he'd told them flatly. "Whatever you can imagine, it's going to be worse. You three are being assigned primarily to assist me, Commander Lewis, and Commander Henshaw. Despite that, you may find yourselves in positions where you have to make on-the-spot decisions. If so, use your own judgment and keep me or Commander Lewis informed at all times. Major Kaczmarczyk and Lieutenant Kelso will be responsible for securing enemy perso
"Yes, Sir." It had been d'Arezzo, and Helen had glanced at him from the corner of her eye.
"What is it, Mr. d'Arezzo?"
"I understand the Marines will be in charge of securing the prisoners, Sir. But what about their wounded? I'm sure we're going to be ru
"That's why you have sidearms, Mr. d'Arezzo. All of you," the Exec's eyes had bored into theirs, "remember what you're dealing with here. Commander Orban's sickbay attendants will have primary responsibility for stabilizing any wounded perso
"Yes, Sir!" they'd replied in unison, and he'd nodded.
"All right." He'd jerked his head at the waiting pi
Now Helen looked out the port beside her as Commander Lewis' pi
She listened to the rattle of orders as Lieutenant Angelique Kelso's First Platoon's shuttles docked. Only Anhur 's forward boat bay would hold atmosphere, and Captain Kaczmarczyk was obviously disinclined to take any avoidable chances. Kelso had her first squad in full battle armor, and he sent them in first to secure the bay galleries before the remainder of the skinsuited Marines boarded.
Aivars Terekhov stared at the main bridge display. Its imagery was relayed from Angelique Kelso's helmet pickup as she and her Marines took control of Anhur 's single functional boat bay. There were no signs of damage in the immaculate boat bay. Or, at least, not of physical damage to the ship. The white-faced, shocked officer waiting to greet Kelso as she came aboard was another matter. His left arm hung in a blood-spotted sling, his crimson uniform tunic was torn and covered with dust, where it wasn't dotted with dried fire-suppressive foam, his left cheek was badly blistered, and the hair on the left side of his head was singed. At least half the perso
Or, rather, they no longer belonged to the Republic of Haven.
"Well," he said after a moment, as the first, sharp astonishment eased, "I have to admit this is... an unexpected development."
Someone snorted, and he glanced up. Naomi Kaplan stood beside his command chair, watching-along with the rest of Hexapuma 's skeleton bridge watch-as Kelso finished securing the boat bay gallery and the rest of her Marines followed First Squad aboard.
"State Security?" The tac officer shook her head, her expression an odd combination of surprise as deep as Terekhov's own and profound distaste. "Skipper, 'unexpected' is putting it pretty damned mildly, if you'll pardon my saying so!"
"Maybe."
Terekhov felt himself coming back on balance, although the sight of the uniforms which had filled any citizen of the People's Republic of Haven with terror had brought something much stronger than distaste back to him. For four months after the Battle of Hyacinth, he and his surviving perso
The State Security thugs who'd run the POW camp which had engulfed his pitiful handful of survivors had treated them with the viciousness of despair as Eighth Fleet smashed unstoppably into the People's Republic. They'd taken out their fear and hatred on their prisoners with a casual brutality not even the foreknowledge of inevitable defeat had been able to fully deter. Beatings had been common. Several of his people had been raped. Some had been tortured. At least three who other survivors swore had been captured alive and uninjured simply disappeared. And then, in rapid fire, came word of the cease-fire High Ridge was stupid enough to accept... followed eight local days later by news of the Theisman coup against Oscar Saint-Just.
Those eight days had been bad. For those days, StateSec had believed in miracles again-had once again believed its perso
The Peeps had conducted their own investigation afterward, in an effort to determine exactly what had happened, and despite himself, he'd been forced to believe it was a serious attempt. Unfortunately, few StateSec witnesses had been available. Most had been killed when Marines from the local naval picket stormed the SS planetary HQ and POW camps and the howling mobs of local citizens lynched every StateSec trooper, informant, and hanger-on they could catch. The local SS offices had been looted and burned, and most of their records had gone with them. Some of those records had probably been destroyed by StateSec perso
And now this.
He closed his eyes for a moment, face-to-face with a dark and ugly side of himself. The hunger which filled him when Kaplan told him Bogey One was a Mars -class heavy cruiser, for all its strength, couldn't match the hot, personal hatred that uniform kicked to roaring life. And the man wearing it, like everyone else aboard Anhur , was Aivars Terekhov's prisoner. A prisoner who was almost certainly a pirate, not a prisoner of war whose actions had enjoyed the sanction of any government or the protection of the Deneb Accords.
And the penalty for piracy was death.
"'Maybe'?" Kaplan turned to look at him. "Skipper, are you saying you expected something like this? Or that anyone should have?"
"No." Terekhov opened his eyes, and his expression was calm, his tone almost normal, as he turned his chair to face the diminutive tac officer. "I didn't expect anything of the sort, Guns. Although, if you'll recall, I did caution at the time that we couldn't afford to automatically assume we were dealing with Peep naval units."
Despite herself, one of Kaplan's eyebrows tried to creep upward, and he surprised himself with a genuine chuckle.