“Feral human activity has increased,” Traat-Admiral said. “This is only to be expected, given the absence of the fleet and the mobilization. Priority—”
Ktrodni-Stkaa shrieked and thrust his muzzle toward the pickup; Traat-Admiral felt his own claws glide out.
“Yes, the fleet is absent. Always it is absent from where there is fighting to be done. We chase ghosts, Traat-Admiral. This ‘activity’ meant an attack on my estate, Dominant One. A successful attack, when I and my household were absent; my harem slaughtered, my kits destroyed. My generations are cut off!”
Shaken, Traat-Admiral recoiled. A Hero expected to die in battle, but this was another matter altogether.
“Hrrrr,” he said. For a moment his thoughts dwelt on raking claws across the nose of Hroth-Staff-Officer; did he not think that piece of information worth his commander’s attention? Then: “My condolences, Honored Ktrodni-Stkaa. Rest assured that compensation and reprisal will be made.”
“Can land and monkeymeat bring back my blood?” Ktrodni-Stkaa screamed. He was in late middle age; by the time a new brood of kits reached adulthood they would be without a father-patron, dependent on the dubious support of their older half-siblings. And to be sure, Traat-Admiral thought, I would rage and grieve as well, if the kittens who had chewed on my tail were slaughtered by omnivores. But this is a combat situation.
“Control yourself, Honored Ktrodni-Stkaa,” he said. “We are under war regulations. Victory is the best revenge.”
“Victory! Victory over what? Over vacuum, over kittenish bogeymen, you . . . you Third-Gunner!” There was a collective gasp from the bridges of both ships. Traat-Admiral could smell rage kindling among his subordinates at the grossness of the insult; that dampened his own, reminded him of duty. Conservor leaned forward to put himself in the pickup’s field of view.
“You forget the Law,” he said, single eye blazing.
“You have forgotten it, Subverter-of-the-Patriarchal-Past. First you worked tail-entwined with Chuut-Riit—if Riit he truly was—now with this.” He turned to Traat-Admiral with a venomous hiss. “Licking its scarless ear, whispering grass-eater words that always leave us where the danger is not. If true kzintosh of noble liver were in command of this system, the Fleet would have left to subdue the monkeys of Earth a year ago.”
Traat-Admiral crossed his arms, waggled brows. “Then the Fleet would be four light-years away,” he said patiently. “Would this have helped your estate? Is this your warrior logic?”
“A true Hero scratches grass upon steaming logic. A true kzintosh knows only the logic of attack! Your ancestors are nameless, son of Jammed-Litterdrop-Repairer; your nose rubs the dirt at my slave’s feet! Coward.”
This time there was no hush; a chorus of battlescreams filled the air, until the speakers squealed with feedback. Traat-Admiral was opening his mouth to give a command he knew he would regret when the alarm rang.
“Attack. Hostile action. Corvette Brush-Lurker does not report.” The screen divided before him with a holo of Fleet dispositions covering half of Ktrodni-Stkaa’s face; a light was winking in the Traditionalist flotilla, and even as he watched it went from flashing blue to amber.
“Brush-Lurker destroyed. Weapon unknown. Standing by.” The machine’s voice was cool and impersonal, and Traat-Admiral’s almost as much so.
“Maximum alert,” he said. Attendants came running with space armor for him and the Conservor, stripping away the ceremonial outfits. “Ktrodni-Stkaa, shall we put aside personalities while we hunt this thing that dares to kill kzin?”
* * *
“Ah,” Markham said, as the kzinti corvette winked out of existence, its fusion pile destabilized. “It begins.” Begins in a cloud of expanding plasma, stripped atoms of metal and plastic and meat. “Wait for my command.”
The others on the bridge of the Nietzsche stared expressionlessly at their screens, moving and speaking with the same flat lack of expression. There was none of the feeling of controlled tension he remembered from previous actions, not even at the sight of a kzin warship crushed so easily.
“This is better,” he muttered to himself. “More disciplined.” There were times when he missed even backtalk, though . . . “No. This is better.”
“It isn’t,” Jonah said. His face was a little less like a skull, now, but he was wandering in circles, touching things at random. “I . . . are the kzinti . . . rescue . . .” His faced writhed, and he groaned again. “It doesn’t connect, it doesn’t connect.”
“Jonah,” Markham said soothingly. “The kzinti are our enemies, isn’t that so?”
“I . . . think so. Yes. They wanted me to kill a kzin, and I did.”
“Then sit quietly, Jonah, and we will kill many kzin.” To one of the dead-faced ones. “Bring up those three fugitives we hauled in. No, on second thought, just the humans. Keep the kzin under sedation.”
He waited impatiently, listening to the monitored kzinti broadcasts. It was important to keep them waiting, past the point where the instinctive closing of ranks wore thin. And important to have an audience for my triumph, he admitted to himself. No, not my triumph. The Master’s triumph. I am but the chosen instrument.
* * *
“I don’t like the look of this,” Ingrid said, as the blank-faced guard pushed them toward the bridge of the warship. “Markham always kept a taut ship, but this . . . why won’t they talk to us?”
“I think I know why,” Harold whispered back. The bridge was as eerily quiet as the rest of the ship had been, except for— “Jonah!” Ingrid cried. “Jonah, what the hell’s going on?”
“Ingrid?” he said, looking up.
Harold grunted as he met those eyes, remembering. They did not have the flat deadness of the others, or the fanatical gleam of Markham’s. A twisted grimace of—despair? puzzlement?—framed them, as deeply as if it had become a permanent part of the face.
“Ingrid? Is that you?” He smiled, a wet-lipped grimace. “We’re fighting the kzin.” A hand waved vaguely at the computers. “I rigged it up. Put it through here. Better than trying to shift the hardware over from the Ruling Mind. You’ll”—his voice faltered, and tears gleamed in his eyes—”you’ll understand once you’ve met the Master.”
Harold gave her hand a warning squeeze. Time, he thought. We have to play for time.
“Admiral Reichstein-Markham?” he said politely, with precisely the correct inclination of head and shoulders. Dear Father may not have let me in the doors of the Schloss, but 1 know how to play that game. “Harold Yarthkin-Schotmann, at your service. I’ve heard a great deal about you.”
“Ah. Yes.” Markham’s well-bred nose went up, and he looked down it with an expression that was parsecs from the strange rigidity of a moment before. Harold swallowed past the dry lumpiness of his throat, and put on his best poor-relation grin.
“Yes, I haff heard of you as well, Fro Yarthkin,” the Herrenmann said glacially.
Well, that puts me in my place, Harold mused. Aloud: “I wonder if you could do the lady and me a small favor?”
“Perhaps,” Markham said, with a slight return of graciousness.
“Well, we’ve been traveling together for some time now, and . . . well, we’d like to regularize it.” Ingrid started, and he squeezed her hand again. “It’d mean a great deal to the young lady, to have it done by a hero of the Resistance.”
Markham smiled. “Ve haff gone beyond Resistance,” he said. “But as hereditary landholder and ship’s Captain, I am also qualified.” He turned to one of the slumped figures. “Take out number two. Remember, from the same flotilla.” The smile clicked back on as he faced Harold and Ingrid. “Step in front of me, please. Conrad, two steps behind them and keep the stunner aimed.”
* * *
“Attack.” There was a long hiss from the bridge of the Throat-Ripper. “Dreadnought Scream-Maker does not report. Scream-Maker destroyed. Analysis follows.” A pause that stretched. One of their sister ships in the Traditionalist flotilla, and a substantial part of its fighting strength. Three thousand Heroes gone to the claws of the God. “Fusion pile destabilization. Correlating.” Another instant. “Corvette Brush-Lurker now reclassified, fusion pile destabilization.”
“Computer!” Ktrodni-Stkaa’s voice came through the open channel. “Probability of spontaneous failures!”
Faintly, they could hear the reply. “Zero point zero seven percent, plus or minus . . .” The rest faded, as Ktrodni-Stkaa’s face filled the screen.
“Now, traitor,” he said, “now I know which to believe in, grass-eaters in kzinti fur, or invisible bogeymen with access to our repair yards. Did you think it was clever, to gather all loyalty in one spot, a single throat for the fangs of treachery to rip? You will learn better. Briefly.”
“Ktrodni-Stkaa, no, I swear by the fangs of God—” The image cut off. Voices babbled in his ears:
“Gut-Tearer launching fighters—”
“Hit, we have hit!” Damage control klaxons howled. “Taking hits from Blood-Drinker—”
“Traat-Admiral, following units request fire-control release as they are under attack—”
Traat-Admiral felt his gorge rise and his tail sink as he spoke. “Launch fighters. All units, neutralize the traitors. Fire control to Battle Central.” A rolling snarl broke across the bridge, and then the huge weight of Throat-Ripper shuddered. A bank of screens on the Damage Control panel went from green to amber to blood-red. “Communications, broadcast to system: all loyal kzintosh, rally to the Hand of the Patriarch—”