A Deepness in the Sky

The CCC was more than a mile inside the promontory headrock of Lands Command, beneath the old Royal Deepness. A decade ago, the Center had been a huge thing, dozens of intelligence techs with the funny little CRT displays of the era. Behind them had been glassed-in meeting rooms and oversight bridges for the presiding officers. But year by year, computer systems and networks improved. Now Accord Intelligence had better eyes and ears and automation, and the CCC itself was scarcely bigger than a conference room. A quiet, strange conference room of outward-sitting perches. The air was fresh, always lightly moving; bright lighting left no shadows. There were data displays, but now the simplest ones were twelve-color-capable. And there were still technicians, but each of them managed a thousand nodes scattered across the continent and into the near-space recon system. Indirectly, each had hundreds of specialists available for interpretation. Eight technicians, four field-rank officers, a commanding officer. Those were all that need be physically present.

The center screen showed the chief being introduced to Parliament. It was the same commercial feed that the rest of the world saw—External Intelligence had decided not to try to sneak special video into Parliament Hall. One of the techs was working with freeze-frames from the video. He popped up a composite of a dozen snippets, fiddled with the lighting. A scruffy-looking character appeared on the screen, the details of her dark clothing vague. Beside Belga, General Coldhaven said softly, "Good. That's a positive identification. Ol' Pedure herself....She can't very well act when her own head is on the line."

Underville listened with half her attention. There was so much going on....The General's speech was even more a shock than seeing Pedure. When Smith made the hostage offer, several of the technicians looked from their work, their eating hands frozen in their maws. "God!" she heard Elno Coldhaven mutter.

"Yeah," Belga whispered back. "But if they go for it, we might have a way out."

"If they pick the King as hostage. But if they want General Smith—" If Smith had to stay down South, things would get very complicated, especially for Elno Coldhaven. Coldhaven couldn't quite conceal his stark discomfort.So this is news to him, too.

"We can manage," said Kred Dugway, the Director of Air Defense. Dugway was the only other general officer present. The AD director had been one of poor Thract's biggest critics, and Elno Coldhaven's former superior. And Dugway seemed to think he was still Elno's boss.

In the video from Southland, General Smith had climbed down from the speaker's perch. She handed her formal proposal to Tim Downing. The camera followed Smith offstage. "She's headed for Pedure!"

Dugway chuckled. "Now,this will be interesting."

"Damn." The camera had turned back to watch Major Downing hand out copies of the General's proposal.

"Can you give me anything on the chief? Does she still have audio?"

"Sorry, sir. No."

Attention colors lit the Air Defense displays. The technician hunched down, hissed something over his voice link. Then, "Sir, I don't understand quite what is happening, but—"

Dugway jabbed a hand at the composite situation map of Southland. "Those are launches!"

Yes. Even Belga recognized the coding. Crosses marked the estimated launch sites. "A launch of three.Not Southland-based; those are from ice subs. They could be—" They couldn't be anything but Kindred. Accord and Kindred were the only nations with missile-launching ice-tunnelers.

And now the first target estimates had appeared on the display. The three circles were all near the south pole.

Coldhaven made a chopping gesture at the attack-management technicians. "Go to condition Most Bright." On the main display, the news cameras were still panning around Parliament Hall, soaking up the reactions to General Smith's speech.

One of the attack-management techs rose from her perch. "Sir! Those missiles are ours. They're from the Seventh, theIcedug andCrawlunder !"

"Says what?" General Coldhaven's voice cut through whatever his former boss had been about to say.

"Autologs from the ships themselves. I'm trying to get through to their captains right now, sir—we're still bidding each other's crypto."

Dugway pounced on the report. "And until we talk to them direct, I don't believe anything. I know those commanders. Something strange is going on here."

"We have real launches and real targets, sir." The technician tapped the crosses and circles.

Dugway: "You have nothing but pretty lights!"

"It's across the secure net, sir, direct from our launch-detection satellites."

Coldhaven motioned both of them to be quiet. "This seems a bit like the problems my predecessor ran into."

Dugway glared at his former protégé...and slowly the significance seemed to sink in. "Yes... ."