Nova War

And even though Dakota's increasingly prolonged absences grew harder for him to explain away, Corso started to notice a shift in attitudes among those previously forced to report to him – a grudging respect that gradually became less grudging as further weeks passed. Almost three months after the battle with the Emissaries, Corso woke with the realization he wasn't alone. He sat up with a start to see a figure perched on the edge of his office couch, on which he'd fallen asleep.

He blinked in confusion, the silhouette leaning forward until the dim light from a still-active slate on the desk illuminated her features.

'Dakota?'

She smiled. 'Sorry for waking you.'

He pulled himself upright and reached up to rub at his tired eyes.

'So are they still complaining that too many of the navigators are coming from Bellhaven?' she asked.

Like you don't know everything about that already. 'Not as much as before,' he confirmed u

She laughed. 'True, it's been… it's been a while.' Something in her expression when she said it's been a while sent a shiver down his back. 'I've been very busy. I'm leaving, within the hour. I don't know when I'll be back, Lucas. Maybe never, if things don't work out.'

'Oh.' He leaned back, shocked.

'It's hardly unexpected,' she said. 'Is something particularly worrying you?'

'One of the main things working to the Authority's advantage is that so many of the people we deal with are scared of you. You're like a bogeyman for the post-Shoal generation, flying into suns and destroying anyone who crosses you.' He shrugged. 'Without you around, it'll be harder to keep them scared.'

'Gee, thanks.'

Corso flashed her a placatory grin.

'There's some things we have to discuss before I leave,' she said. 'For one, I don't know if the Shoal are ever likely to return, but if they do, it's certainly not going to be on friendly terms, so you're going to have to disabuse Greeley and Maknamuri and the rest of those idiots who think otherwise. All we are to the Shoal is a potential rival, especially once we start building our own drives. But meanwhile, as long as they're caught up in this escalating war with the Emissaries, and as long as they realize what I could do to them, they might keep their distance.'

'What can you do them?' He shook his head groggily. 'Apart from the obvious, I mean.'

'I have the coordinates of the Shoal home world, and that's one of their most precious secrets. If the Emissaries knew just where to locate it, they could deal the Hegemony a killing blow.'

Corso sat straight up. 'Or, they could destroy this entire system, and hope they kill you as well as the rest of us. That would solve their problem. Is that the real reason you're leaving? To draw fire away from the rest of us?'

She nodded. 'Ocean's Deep is going to become more vulnerable to attack from outside the more time I spend here. But the Shoal don't have a sun, Lucas. They're moving their entire world into a region with very few stars at all, simply to minimize the risk of being destroyed. But if they do make the mistake of attacking us, I can then transmit the coordinates of their world to the Emissaries. And then they'll really have a fight on their hands.'

So much power, he reflected. It was easier, he was finding, not to think of Dakota as quite human.

Corso rubbed at his face, not wanting to think further about galactic empires and exploding stars. 'Well, I expect we can handle things okay while you're away. We've got almost a dozen navigators out there already, and another couple of dozen new candidates Langley's ru

'That's a good idea,' Dakota replied, her thoughts clearly somewhere far away. But her attention seemed to come back to focus fully on Corso once more.

'You're pla

She shifted position on the couch and put a hand on his shoulder. 'The one thing we both know, and that nobody's really talking about, is that even a thousand Peacekeeper ships aren't going to be enough to maintain some kind of unity throughout the Consortium. We need something more. We need to make our own coreships, but we don't have the means to hollow entire moons like the Shoal do. What we do have are boosted worlds like Sant D'Arcangelo. There's no reason we couldn't install drive spines on it and fly it around the universe.'

He thought carefully for a moment before replying. 'A lot of boosted worlds are nations in their own right, Dak. You can't just march up, stick a pirate flag on them and sail off into the wide blue yonder.'

'But we might have to do that, if we ever need to transfer large populations. Some of those worlds that had coreship populations dumped on them are only months away from disaster unless we can help them to at least alleviate the pressure.'

He stared at her incredulously. 'And what kind of time-scale do you have in mind for all this? It was hard enough just to create the Authority, and now you'd like to re-create the Hegemony's core-ship fleet?'

'Too difficult,' she replied. 'Instead we're going to steal one.'

'Excuse me?'

Her lips twisted in a grin. 'We're going to steal a coreship. Maybe even more than one.'

'Dakota-'

'Listen to me. There are abandoned coreships to be found in a couple of systems close to the territories disputed between the Shoal and Emissaries. There's another one a lot closer to home that got badly damaged. It barely got out of the Night's End system before it went nova. That's the first one we're going to try for. It's still carrying out extensive repairs in an uninhabited system about twenty light-years from here. I've already sent the coordinates to your data-sheet.'

'Steal a coreship?.' It was lunatic, desperate, inconceivable, and yet he found himself fighting to suppress a grin. 'You're even crazier than I thought. You seriously believe we can do this?'

'No, Lucas, I believe you can do it. You and the Authority together.' She smiled broadly. 'And we both know your job's actually going to be a lot easier without having me around for a while. They won't keep treating you like a direct line to me any more. They'll be asking you what to do next – and nobody else.'

At first, Corso couldn't quite frame a reply, knowing what she said was true. Without Dakota's presence, the Peacekeeper Authority might have a chance to come into its own, to make real decisions without constantly wondering if Dakota would object.

All right,' he said finally. 'In that case, we'll have to decide on an official statement regarding your whereabouts – something the politicians and press can understand.'

'Thank you.'

He settled back, feeling too tired to really think clearly. 'Sometimes I don't know whether I should hate you or thank you for making me take on this job.'

'Nobody forced you, Lucas. Remember, I only asked. You could have just walked away.'

And left you the only one in charge?' He gri

'You must know by now that you can do a lot more good here than you ever could have done back on Redstone-'

'I know, I know,' he muttered.

An awkward silence fell over them. This is it, he thought.

She stood up, looking momentarily awkward. 'Goodbye for now, Lucas. Take care of things. Take care of the Piri Reis.'

He knew the Piri Reis was never likely to fly again.

'Some people were talking about setting up a museum here on the station,' he said. 'Some subcommittee or other with too much time on their hands. We could probably put it there.'