Rebel Page 8

  “Not successful at all,” Mannie muttered to his own shrimp-bespeckled salad.

  “What did you say, Mr. Mayor?” the spy said.

  Mannie looked up. “The Marines might succeed in stripping our supply chain of a few days’ worth of food, but they’d never do that again,” he said in a voice firm with resolution. “We aren’t dumb. We’ve been getting around State Security since before most of your Marines were born. We will get around whomever we have to.”

  “I rest my case,” Mr. Smith said, putting down his roll. “The mayors here will orchestrate a system that allows the Navy to be Navy, the industrialists to make things, and the farmers and ranchers to do what they do best. Who knows, they might even get the bankers to do what they’re supposed to do, manage the planet’s financial system for the betterment of all. Such miracles have been known to happen.”

  That drew a chuckle from everyone around the table.

  The commander put down his fork. “I need to make a report to Admiral von Mittleburg.”

  “I hope you will tell him about the more productive parts of our day,” Mannie said.

  “What do you think I should tell him?” the commander asked, with amazing gentleness, Vicky thought, for a fighting man who’d lost a day of his life to interminable meetings.

  “I would suggest that he arrange to have some officers assigned to our committees to coordinate the Navy’s needs with our resources. We may have gotten off on the wrong foot, butting into his area of expertise, but I think we ended on a good note. You give us people who can tell us your needs, and we’ll do what we can to meet them.”

  “That may work or be the best way we can work this mess out.” The commander stood. “Your Grace.”

  “Go with my blessing and good luck.”

  The commander left. The spy seemed to be taking his own measurements of the situation. “I think I will call it a night. Not that I suspect I will get a lot of sleep. I will be checking in with your security detail,” he said, nodding toward Mannie, “and your Marines regularly through the evening.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Smith. I always feel safer when you are somewhere in the shadows.”

  “Thank you, Your Grace,” the spy said, and likewise withdrew.

  Vicky found herself alone in a room with just Mannie, and, of course, Kit and Kat. It seemed the night held all sorts of possibilities. She played with her salad for a few moments while watching through veiled eyelashes as Mannie attacked his.

  “So, what do you do for excitement around here?” she finally said.

  “I’m hardly the one to ask. My ex-wife said I was about the most unexciting man on the planet.”

  “Ex?” Vicky said.

  “High-school sweetheart. I guess she didn’t know me as well as she thought. Anyway, enough about me. What does the Navy do for excitement?”

  “Oh, blow up this or shoot up that,” Vicky said, moving her salad from one side of the plate to the other. “After I got caught in the paint locker with a junior officer, excitement has been limited to official excitement the Navy approves of.”

  “And the paint locker is not approved of?”

  “Oh, very much not approved of,” Vicky said with an arched eyebrow.

  Mannie sniffed. “This room certainly does not smell of paint.”

  “I have noticed that. I think the hot tub could be most exciting.”

  “Those two young women look only too eager to be lifeguards,” Mannie said, half laughing as he nodded at Kit and Kat.

  They grinned back most willingly.

  “I haven’t seen them as enthusiastic for a job since the last time they almost got to kill someone,” Vicky said.

  “Are you offering me what I think you are?” Mannie said with a significant gulp.

  “A dip in the hot tub with three lovely young women and not a swimsuit in sight,” Vicky said, casually. “I do think so.”

  Kit and Kat nodded, obviously well into the thought.

  “An adolescent boy’s dream of heaven,” Mannie said.

  “And only seconds away for you,” Vicky said.

  Kit and Kat kicked off their shoes and began removing their pants.

  Mannie watched them with a happy smile, then sadly shook his head.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?” Vicky said, startled at the very first no she’d encountered since puberty hit her like a ton of feathers.

  “Correct me if I’m wrong, but can’t most of the trouble we are in be traced to a certain Peterwald falling into bed?”

  “I’m not my stepmother,” Vicky said with edge.

  “I don’t see you that way, but I need to make a lot of things happen here on St. Petersburg. To do that, I need the goodwill of a lot of people who aren’t sure they can trust anyone outside their own small circle of friends. How will they look at me when they see me in bed with a Peterwald?”

  Mannie put down his fork and stood up. “As much as I would love to stay, ladies, I fear that I must trudge my way to the door. I assure you, I will have fond dreams of all of you tonight.”

  Kit and Kat had finished stripping. They stood, hands on hips, giving Mannie a spectacular view of what he would be only dreaming about.

  Vicky said nothing as Mannie made his way to the door, not looking back. He said he had to go, and she would let him.

  “Well, that was not what I expected,” Kit said. “But the tub, it is so nice and warm.”

  “It would be a shame to waste it,” Kat pointed out.

  Vicky gave the firmly closed door one last look. Should she have done more to undermine Mannie’s self-control? Did she respect his judgment of their situation enough to let him decide for the both of them that they had to be off-limits to each other?

  She sighed. Mannie was off-limits. The commander was off-limits. That did leave the two delightful assassins.

  “Last one in has to massage the rest,” Vicky said with an eager grin full of evil intent.

  “But we are ready now,” Kit said, backing toward the balcony, where the pool bubbled.

  “Then I’ll get my hands all over you two,” Vicky said, reaching with clawing hands for the two of them.

  They charged her, bowling her over, and began stripping her right there on the carpet. There were a lot of fingers going here and there as well. Just who splashed into the hot tub last was never determined.

  CHAPTER 13

  VICKY spent the next couple of days touring the major cities on St. Petersburg, smiling for the camera while it replayed the Battle of the Heart Attack. She quickly developed a standard speech that highlighted the danger their homes and planet had been in, the Navy’s rapid movement to their defense, and their sudden acquisition of a fleet of ships with hungry Sailors and many other needs.

  Mayors thanked her, a gratitude Vicky accepted in the name of the Navy. Little girls gave her flowers and jars full of copper pfennigs toward the maintenance of the fleet. Vicky smiled and said nothing about her hope that their parents might be willing to give a lot more.

  Vicky slowly came to the understanding of the true value of a Grand Duchess. She didn’t so much do as allow others to do things in her name. She was the physical embodiment of other people, both those giving and those receiving. She imagined that a flag might have worked better, but her smiling face and hands to give and take seemed to work quite well.

  It kept her busy, almost enough not to notice that Mannie was nowhere in sight.

  When she thought about it, she realized that his disappearance was inevitable. He had a job to do, and she had what she was doing. Their duties took them in different directions.

  If they had become entangled in a scandal, neither one of them would be as good at their jobs as they were right now.

  Mannie knew his people. While Vicky might consider it just fun to fool around in the hot tub, he made a call, and she had to respect him for it.

  The Navy had taught her the Navy Way. Now Mannie was introducing her to the political way.

&nbs
p; The fact she didn’t much like either way had nothing to do with anything that mattered.

  Four days of smiling and saying just the right thing had her about ready to sign on again as a boot ensign under Admiral Krätz’s heavy and demanding hand. She was not at all disappointed when Admiral von Mittleburg called to say the convoy to Brunswick was fully loaded.

  “Oh, and I have created a new job to coordinate dealings with St. Petersburg or other planets for the logistic needs of the reserve fleet.”

  “You have. Did you pick anyone I might wish horrible things upon?” Vicky said.

  “Captain Etterlin, formerly of the Retribution.”

  “I can’t think of a man more deserving of the promotion,” Vicky said, fighting a laugh but not very successfully. “Will he be sitting in on meetings and saving my tush from long hours in hard chairs?”

  “No doubt. The Attacker is not yet out of the yard. I’ve offered the Retribution to Captain Bolesław.”

  “He did a good job of bringing in the Attacker when it could have easily been lost with all hands, and my head as well.”

  “Yes, I thought you might say something like that. Anyway, all joking aside, Your Grace, you need to be under way and quickly. As I might have mentioned, I’m sending the battlecruiser Slinger and the newly acquired large heavy cruisers Wittenberg and Augsburg along with you. I’m holding back Rostock for here, so you’ll be using Sovereign of the Stars for your jump-point scout.”

  “How soon can you send a shuttle for me?”

  “I have my own barge on final approach to the Kiev spaceport.”

  Vicky looked around the limo she was presently in. The commander and Mr. Smith, Kit and Kat were there. “Did we leave anything in the room this morning?”

  “Everything you own dirtside is in the boot,” Kit said.

  “Commander, tell the driver our destination has changed. It is now the shuttleport.”

  Four hours later, they were on their way, leading a convoy of fifteen freighters to Brunswick. The voyage was quick. Their arrival was the shock this time.

  CHAPTER 14

  A week later, Retribution followed Sovereign of the Stars through the jump point to the Brunswick system. In only a moment, Lieutenant Blue was reporting on what was in orbit around Brunswick.

  “It seems we are not the only fleet in this system,” Captain Bolesław said after Lieutenant Blue finished his more in-depth analysis of what was ahead of them.

  “How bad is it?” Vicky asked. She had a pretty good idea it was bad, but it was the captain’s prerogative to say the worst, and she needed to know just how bad he saw it.

  “Two battleships are tied up to High Brunswick Station,” her captain said. “The Savage and the Ferocity according to your Mr. Blue although they are squawking as the Reprisal and Revenge.”

  “Do we have any battleships of that name?” Vicky asked.

  “Not since they were scrapped ten years back.”

  “What about the Savage and the Ferocity? Were they scheduled for scrapping?”

  “Not that I know of, but we aren’t getting the most up-to-date news out here.”

  Vicky couldn’t argue with that. “So do you know anything about the skippers of those two battleships?”

  Captain Bolesław eyed his own commlink. “Yes. I know them.”

  “We’ll just have to wait until we get in closer to see if you can do anything with them. About the cruisers?”

  “The Koln and Emden are heavy cruisers, though not as strong as ours. Their main battery is twelve 8-inchers. We have twelve 9.2-inchers on the Wittenberg and Augsburg. In a fight, though, the quality of the crew might be more telling than the extra power of the lasers.”

  The commlink came alive. “Put it on screen,” Captain Bolesław said.

  “Ships entering Brunswick space from outside the Imperial Security Zone, you are forbidden any contact with those protected by Imperial Security. You will attempt no contact and return immediately from whence you came.”

  Captain Bolesław eyed Vicky.

  She nodded. “So that’s the way it is. I guess my stepmama got here ahead of us. Lieutenant Blue, how strong is the Empress’s grip?”

  “I can’t honestly say at the moment, Your Grace. I’ll need more time to analyze the communications I can hack off the station and planet.”

  “While he’s doing that, Captain, why don’t we close on the Imperial Security bubble?”

  “Dare we risk popping it?” the captain asked, an eager grin playing at the edge of his lips.

  “God forbid I should do such a thing.”

  “Yeah, right,” the captain muttered, but he turned to his navigator and had him set a course for High Brunswick Station. “One gee if you will.”

  “One gee it is,” the helmsman answered, and Vicky’s tiny fleet headed in to stick their heads in the Empress’s maw.

  CHAPTER 15

  FOR four hours, they accelerated toward Brunswick, and nothing happened.

  The Sovereign of the Stars maneuvered over to lead the column of fifteen freighters; now the Retribution led the Slinger, Wittenberg, and Augsburg in a second column fifteen thousand klicks to port. Vicky organized her small fleet, but from the ships docked on High Brunswick, there was not a sound.

  “No communications at all between them?” Vicky asked.

  “Not so much as a time check on their net,” Lieutenant Blue replied. “I’ve never seen a net so silent.”

  “Could they have done something to jack up their net security?”

  The lieutenant shrugged. “With them, it’s always possible, Your Grace, but I really can’t believe that our best has been left totally facedown in the mud.”

  Vicky hoped he was right.

  “There is a second possibility,” Captain Bolesław said softly, his hand over his mouth.

  “I’m all ears,” Vicky said, and even Lieutenant Blue leaned close.

  “There is old-fashioned shoe leather. If you send a runner to call a meeting, there is no net traffic. You get all your interested parties in one room, and there is nothing for the good lieutenant to eavesdrop on.”

  “How tacky,” Vicky said. “You’d think they don’t trust us.”

  “As hard as that might seem,” the captain said.

  They continued to wait for several more hours. On the one hand, Vicky didn’t mind the delay. Conversations in space with speed-of-light delays were so ineffective. How could she talk someone into a decent heart attack if it took an hour or more for each verbal jab to cross space?

  The longer it took them to start talking, the shorter the delays between verbal sallies.

  Still, it was nerve-racking to wait, wondering what they were up against.

  “You know the skippers of the ships tied up at High Brunswick,” Vicky finally said to Captain Bolesław.

  “Yes. The skipper of the Savage, now Reprisal, spent four years just down the hall from me during my Academy years. He was a bit of a rounder. If there was a prank going on, he was likely at the bottom of it. He finished below the middle of the class. I never would have expected him to get a battleship in my Navy. But then, maybe the Reprisal isn’t in my Navy now. Time will tell.”

  Yes, time will tell.

  Vicky decided she might as well spend some of the time getting a good nap. She was asleep when they reached midpoint in their approach, and the convoy flipped over and began to decelerate toward Brunswick.

  The nap had turned into a good night’s sleep and she felt well rested and refreshed by a fast shower and a new set of whites when she returned to the bridge.

  “Anything happen?” she asked the officer of the deck.

  “Not a thing, Your Grace. The captain is in his in-space cabin, and I have orders to wake him if anything new develops, but it’s been a very quiet watch.”

  Vicky turned toward the sensor station. A chief had the watch there.

  “Anything to report?”

  “The ships at the station are still observing strict emissions
control, Your Grace. We have made a thorough analysis of the planet’s public network. It appears normal. The media is reporting the usual stuff. Cat up a tree. Dog bites dog. We have successfully hacked the police net. There’s nothing like a security presence. The lieutenant told me to tell you that he doesn’t think the Security Consultants have actually landed on Brunswick.”

  “Is he absolutely sure of that, Chief?”

  The senior countermeasures tech looked pained. “Beg your pardon, ma’am, but there are no absolutes in this game.”

  “Pardon me for showing my ignorance. Thank you, Chief.”

  “You’re welcome, Your Grace.”

  “Would Your Grace care for a cup of tea?” the OOD asked.

  “Please.”

  Vicky noted that sometime during her nap, a command chair had been added next to the captain’s. On its back was stenciled: GRAND DUCHESS.

  Vicky settled in and soon found a steaming mug of tea at her elbow.

  She sipped it while staring at the main screen; it showed the planet ahead of them getting larger. Still, it stayed a mystery.

  Then the screen lit up. “Stand by for a formal declaration by Count Korbinian, Lord of Karenhall.”

  “Runner, wake the skipper,” the OOD ordered, and a seaman striker dashed off.

  Captain Bolesław was back on the bridge in a moment, still buttoning up the shirt of his fresh undress whites.

  “Has the message come in?” he asked.

  “Only the alert,” the OOD said. “Nothing of substance.”

  The captain settled into his chair. A chief steward’s mate had a steaming mug of tea waiting for him when he absentmindedly put his hand out while staring at the main screen as if to will it to give up the next message.

  So, of course, the screen obeyed the will of the skipper and did.