Warring States Page 13

  There were plenty of excellent First Officers in Fleet who didn’t want to transition to Command. They tended to be the best, as a matter of fact — people who knew that they would never do another job better than the one they were doing right now, or people whose political intransigence, whose personal integrity, had marked them as people who would decline to execute orders to which they took exception.

  There were captains like that, too, and the Bench had sought to address the problem of Command Branch officers who insisted on thinking for themselves by raising up its own. Crèche-bred Command Branch, children culled from the ranks of orphans to be brought up with the most thorough indoctrination the Bench could design to do as they were told to preserve the rule of Law and the Judicial order.

  It was a good theory. But in practice it had been too successful, producing either mindless martinets or signal failures like Jennet ap Rhiannon, the brevet — acting — captain of the Jurisdiction Fleet Ship Ragnarok.

  Tirom frowned, as if he was trying to remember something; started to shift to stand up and go to the desk — to look for a reference, perhaps — but apparently thought better of it, and relaxed back into his chair again.

  “Thank you, Scylla,” Tirom said. “Have a good transit. See you when you get back, Tirom away, here.”

  That was the communication center’s cue to cut the transmission and return the First Secretary’s office to private status, off monitor. “Scylla away,” the Scylla’s First Officer said, and the clear-tone clicked through. Still Tirom frowned.

  “There was something about that,” he said, mostly to Padrake. “I can’t bring it to mind right now. Can’t have been very important. I hope.”

  “Not as if you’ve got any worries about those people,” Padrake agreed. “Not like the other places.”

  Tirom nodded, and spoke to Jils. “They’ve been our Fleet assigned resources for three years, now, Specialist Ivers. Sixth Fleet detached at Brisinje. Very formal relationship, but no inappropriate pressure. Not like what’s going on at some of the other Judiciaries right now.”

  “You’d like a little more cooperation on access to their Inquisitor, of course,” Padrake said, as if reminding Tirom of the fact. “The man himself is willing to do his duty, from what I understand. But Captain Irshah Parmin balks.”

  Tirom nodded. “Well, that’s a chronic issue, isn’t it? I don’t like to think what we’d have had to put up with if Verlaine’s reforms had gone through. No offense, Specialist Ivers.”

  Tirom apparently made the assumption that Jils had been personally — as well as professionally — committed to Verlaine’s announced agenda: an immediate halt on the issue of any new Writs to Inquire, no new orientation classes once the current cycle had been completed, an in-depth examination of the cost and benefit of the entire system of Inquiry and the Protocols.

  Its monopoly on the exercise of legal, Judicial torture was one of Fleet’s most jealously cherished prerogatives. Jils wondered if Tirom was one of those who believed that Fleet had been behind Verlaine’s assassination.

  “That’s right,” Padrake said suddenly. “The Ragnarok’s going to Emandis station. You wanted to speak to Scylla about that. Warn them, no untoward incidents, delicate situation with Convocation, and so forth.”

  The two ideas — Verlaine’s reforms, and the Ragnarok — connected through Inquisition, clearly enough. Whether or not Padrake and Tirom were aware of the fact that Scylla had been Andrej Koscuisko’s first ship of assignment, Andrej Koscuisko was the first person anyone would think of when the general idea of Inquisitors came up, and right now the entire Bench was acutely aware that Koscuisko was on board the Ragnarok.

  What it meant, she was sure nobody could figure out. Dolgorukij were in general ferociously conservative people, what the Ragnarok was doing was reactionary at best, and yet Koscuisko had returned to the ship voluntarily and was apparently intent on staying there, thus reducing the range of punitive actions that the Bench could take against the Ragnarok without offending the powerful Dolgorukij Combine to a very narrow range of highly unsatisfactory and mostly symbolic gestures of disdain.

  Jils, however, knew precisely why Andrej Koscuisko had returned to his ship. Further than that, she knew that Koscuisko had asked her to put the recording of the relief of Writ that Verlaine had offered him on hold until the Ragnarok’s appeal had been decided: an act of significant personal courage on his part, in her estimation.

  Both she and Koscuisko knew that pending his relief of Writ he could be called to duty at any time as a professional torturer as well as the Ragnarok’s chief medical officer and ship’s surgeon. Both she and Koscuisko knew that he would refuse to execute the Protocols unless he could do it according to a strict standard of his own, and that nothing above the third level would fit that definition. Also that refusal to implement the Protocols at an adjudged and authorized level was an act of mutiny, one of the very few crimes for which even an Inquisitor could and would be prosecuted at the Tenth Level.

  Tirom was rolling a cookie on edge on his snack-plate as though the gradual erosion of the crumb held a message for him. “Yes,” he said. “Quite right. I wanted to discourage Scylla from having any contact with that outfit. I particularly wanted to ensure that any ship-to-ship communications were on record and between officers only.”

  Tirom was afraid that something on the Ragnarok was catching, or could spread from crew to crew like an infection. The real problem with the Ragnarok wasn’t its crew. Jils had been there; she knew. The problem with the Ragnarok was that its officers were non-compliant, and its commander Jennet ap Rhiannon had been so thoroughly indoctrinated by her Bench crèche teachers that she did not doubt for one instant that her duty to protect her crew from illegal imposition was self-evident to any right-thinking person.

  “But you know Irshah Parmin. You can be confident of his discretion.” Padrake spoke as if of a predecided solution, reaching for a fresh flask of kilpers. “None of the pressure Fleet’s putting on Haspirzak, for instance.”

  Jils stirred her now-lukewarm kilpers and listened. She hadn’t kept up on everything that was going on.

  Tirom made a face, and shook his head. “I’d like to see anybody attempt to suggest that the Emandisan home defense fleet wasn’t up to any incidental increase in civil unrest. Fleet has no basis for trying to squeeze more tax revenues out of Brisinje for more ships and crew. You don’t see them kicking up at Sant-Dasidar either.”

  The Emandisan home defense fleet, the Dolgorukij Combine’s home defense fleet. The Bench had been quietly waiving one restriction on the Combine fleet after another, over the years. What harm did it do to let the Combine maintain more ships, heavier armament, more crew than the original accords had permitted? There was only one Combine, and nine Judiciaries. The more money the Combine wanted to put into its home defense fleet the more available resources there were for Fleet to borrow for one reason or another when they wanted a little extra muscle that they didn’t have to pay for.

  “That’s right,” Padrake agreed cheerfully. “So long as they don’t go Langsarik on us. I’ll show Specialist Ivers to her quarters, Arik, see you tomorrow?”

  As a subtle way of taking control of the conversation and ending it, this was nothing of the sort. Jils covered her surprise. It was difficult not to pass judgment on both of them, but she clearly didn’t understand the nature of their relationship so it was best to avoid disapproving of it until she had better information.

  “Opening ceremonies,” Tirom confirmed with a sigh. “Make sure that Padrake gives you a good dinner, Dame, because you’re going to be eating pre-packs for the rest of the convocation.”

  Lovely. But reasonable. Convocation would be conducted under quarantine, Bench specialists weren’t generally known for their culinary skills and it wouldn’t be appropriate to ask them to cook for one another if they were, what with all of their energies needed for the work of the convocation itself. Pre-packs were the obvious, if unpalatable, solutio
n.

  “I’ll do so without fail, First Secretary,” Padrake answered for Jils, with a polite bow. “Jils. Shall we?”

  There were worse offers. She was tired; she’d had enough of duty, responsibility, the rule of Law and the Judicial order — at least for one night.

  Just for tonight she was simply going to go along with Padrake, have a good dinner, find out what had been going on in Padrake’s life. And let the rest of it go until tomorrow.

  ###

  The archived image on the screen was identified by its margin-codings having been generated off parallax from Taisheki Station on the occasion — nearly a year gone by, now — of the Ragnarok’s declining to stop in and stay for a while.

  Information and data received from the ships and monitoring stations in the immediate area had been used to build a picture that could be viewed from any angle; to Caleigh, it seemed as though she were in a neutral observer station standing well off of Taisheki watching the Ragnarok heading for the entry vector and the artillery platforms that were there waiting for it.

  But there was more than that — there was a thula. A Kospodar thula, weaving its way in amongst the artillery platforms, blowing them up, one by one by one, and even with the data-refs that the footing line was displaying on the screen it was hard to believe that the picture had not been doctored to increase the relative speed of the little ship.

  “I want it,” Ship’s Engineer said. “It’s my natal day, Captain. Have I ever asked you for anything? I want that thula. I’ve never seen anything move like that in my life.”

  Chief Warrant Officer Caleigh Samons had been assigned to the Jurisdiction Fleet Ship Scylla for eleven years, most of which had been about as good as anybody would expect. She’d handled Security teams for the chief medical officer, which meant of course that she also managed bond-involuntaries for the CMO’s use in his or her role as Inquisitor.

  Up until the time Koscuisko had been assigned she had touched those teams as lightly as possible, not wanting to know what use their officer of assignment made of them, perfectly content to restrict herself to training and physical conditioning. They were condemned criminals, after all, but they were there because they could be forced to do things that few people would do of their own free will, and nobody liked to think about that.

  After Koscuisko it had been different. Koscuisko had been young, naïve, inexperienced, at ease in surgery and nowhere else, conscious of his general lack of experience in every aspect of Infirmary that mattered; but Koscuisko had insisted on engaging with his personal discomfort, pressing forward to learn and gain in understanding even at the cost of being made to look foolish, and Koscuisko had not been content to turn his back on bond-involuntaries. They were not objects. They were not beyond help or hope. All Koscuisko had done was to look into their faces in the same way he would look at any soul, and it had changed things forever.

  The captain had seen enough of Koscuisko’s relationships with his Security to respect his junior officer more deeply than he’d ever cared to admit to Koscuisko. A man like Irshah Parmin was accustomed to taking an officer’s measure by the way he treated his subordinates when nobody was there to see, and it had become clear that whatever Koscuisko was doing with his people it was powerful enough to transform them from men who lived in fear, condemned never to act but always only react, into people who had realized that there was a way after all for them to reclaim a portion of their freedom in their own minds, in their lives.

  It was only because of Koscuisko’s relationship with his Security in general and the bond-involuntaries in particular that Fleet Captain Irshah Parmin had not enforced the letter of the laws of military courtesy and discipline against Koscuisko on a daily basis.

  And ever since Koscuisko had cried failure of Writ at the Domitt Prison, the captain had blamed himself for failing to put the fear of Hell into his young officer, convinced that if Koscuisko would not learn that discretion was the better part of valor he would never survive his time in Fleet. She knew.

  The captain had discussed the issue with her on more than one occasion, using her as a sounding-board to work out the itch of his personal aggravation so that he could evaluate and judge some stunt that Koscuisko had pulled on its own merits rather than its potentially implied disrespect of, and consequent insult to, Koscuisko’s chain of command.

  She hadn’t heard too much about it in the five or six years since Koscuisko had been transferred away to the Ragnarok, except when the captain chanced to express his frustration with his CMO’s performance by comparing it to the ship’s surgeon he’d had in Andrej Koscuisko. At such times it was clearly not helpful to remind the captain that while Koscuisko’s technical competence in surgery could not be faulted, Irshah Parmin had found fault with almost everything else about the man.

  The captain pushed the toggle-feed on the bar in front of his chair to its neutral position, and the image on the far wall of the officer’s mess froze on a slice of the archival record. She’d heard about it; but this was the first chance she’d had to see it — that was why the captain had sent for her especially. Shared experience of aggravation.

  “So long as I’m not needed here, your Excellency, I’d be more than happy to take a temporary posting to help handle the processing, when they run the Ragnarok to ground. Imagine. Interrogating Andrej Koscuisko. What a privilege that would be.”

  That was Doctor Weasel-Boy. Doctor Lazarbee, but it was almost impossible to think of him by that name. Sooner or later she was going to slip and call him Weasel-Boy, she knew it. It was just as well that she had bond-involuntaries to learn from: there would be less danger of making a slip if she took care to address him as “your Excellency.”

  Captain Irshah Parmin didn’t seem to have heard Weasel-Boy speak. “Look at that son of a bitch,” he said. “I heard that he was on that monster. Him. A surgeon. I knew he was a problem, but I never dreamed it was catching.”

  From Koscuisko to the entire ship’s crew of the Ragnarok, he meant — Caleigh thought. “That’s not fair,” First Officer said. “He never bit anybody the entire time he was here. And that lieutenant ap Rhiannon had a reputation of her own, don’t forget, capable of anything.”

  Irshah Parmin smiled, but shook his head. “It’s him, I tell you. Four years under Lowden would make a rabid dog out of anybody.”

  There’d been betting, though Caleigh wasn’t supposed to have known about it. It was nothing personal. They’d all heard about the Ragnarok; four Ship’s Inquisitors in five years. An accident in a service house, an accidental overdose, something very regrettable in Secured Medical that not even the gossips would talk about; what had happened to the other one?

  “He seems to have done almost everything except his plain duty.” That was Weasel-Boy again. For a disagreeable man he had an unusually sonorous voice; she was still getting used to it. Cognitive dissonance, she thought it was called. “Did this joker ever actually do any work? Any work at all?”

  The question was in poor taste on more than one level, one of which was the fact that it implied criticism of Irshah Parmin, Koscuisko’s former commander. And everybody on the captain’s staff in this room, with the possible exception of Weasel-Boy himself, had seen evidence of Koscuisko’s surgical skills for themselves, never mind his other duties.

  Sighing, the captain keyed the toggle back a few instants and then forward again. The Kospodar thula moved like a much smaller ship, lithe and agile; even at extreme magnification the speed with which it moved was remarkable to see.

  “One of his Bonds flying that thing,” Caleigh said, proudly. “That’s the rumor I heard, anyway, Captain.”

  “Well, of course the man was on Safe at the time — ” Weasel-Boy started to protest.

  The captain raised a hand. “Let’s just avoid spreading any wild irresponsible rumors,” he said. “It clearly couldn’t have been a bond-involuntary, that would have violated restrictions and requirements. So the question of Safes is immaterial, and I don’t want t
o hear anything more about it.”

  Caleigh bowed, solemnly, well and truly reprimanded. Or something. Irshah Parmin winked — but so quickly she couldn’t be sure she’d seen it — and continued.

  “The point, gentles, is that the Ragnarok is clearly capable of anything.” Shooting its way out of Taisheki Station to avoid being forced to surrender any crew to Inquiry, knowing full well that a Fleet Interrogations Group had been seconded. Well, shooting out an artillery net that was being fielded to prevent the Ragnarok’s access to the exit vector, at least — with a battle cannon on a private courier, and where had the Ragnarok come up with one of those, unless it was true about the case of deck wipes and Admiral Brecinn’s arrangements with reasonable people?

  “And as we are en route to Emandis Station we may be unfortunate enough to encounter this dangerous renegade. Emandis Station is administratively assigned to the Emandisan home defense fleet, which has jurisdiction, and it would be prudent of us all to remember that everybody is very sensitive about their prerogatives these days. No trouble.”

  Doctor Weasel-Boy snorted contemptuously. A relative newcomer, he hadn’t encountered the rough side of the captain’s temper yet. It’d only been a few months since he’d been transferred from the Galven at Ygau. Koscuisko’s successor hadn’t been half the surgeon Koscuisko had been but she hadn’t needed a fraction of the management, either, and the ship had gotten along very well with her.

  If she used bond-involuntaries to execute the Protocols that was what bond-involuntaries were for, and Parmin had never liked sharing his medical officer with the Bench and did so as sparingly as possible. It had been a good few years. What Doctor Weasel-Boy’s regime would be like was anybody’s guess, but he hadn’t made a promising start by going through channels suspected of being reasonable in order to arrange a mid-assignment transfer. They’d been sorry to see Doctor Aldrai go.