Звезда Пандоры

“I’ve never heard of this Paul Cramley. You can’t prove anything.”

Myo’s stare hardened. “I don’t have to. You are interfering with a government official, which is also an offense.”

“You’re not, you got fi—” Mellanie drew a deep breath. “I’m sorry, I was desperate for an interview with you.”

“I don’t give interviews. Everyone in your profession knows that.”

“But you must be able to tell me if there are any suspects in the Burnelli murder.”

“Ask the navy intelligence media office for an update.”

“They’re not as good as you. If they do catch anyone it’ll be on the foundation you laid. I want the whole story.”

“I don’t respond to flattery, either.”

“I’m not flattering you. I despise you. But I’m also a realist.”

A dark gray limousine drew up to the curb beside them. Its rear door opened. “You’re wasting your time following me,” Myo said. Her plyplastic umbrella flowed back into a simple fat stick. “Even if you were any good, you wouldn’t find anything of interest where I’m going.”

“Where would I find something interesting?”

“In truth, I’m not sure. You might try space, deep space.” She got into the back of the limousine, and its door closed.

Mellanie stood shivering in the rain, watching the plush vehicle’s scarlet taillights merge into the Parisian traffic. “Is it true she never lies?” she asked the SI.

“It is true she never tells a direct lie; though she is capable of modifying the truth if it will forward her investigation.”

Hell. Deep space? Who knows about deep space?

There had been quite a celebration on High Angel last night. StAsaph had returned from another flight, scouting eleven stars. Captain McClain Gilbert had reported that they hadn’t encountered any Prime wormhole activity. Then along with Admiral Kime and Captain Oscar Monroe he’d gone to watch the Dauntless disengage from her assembly platform. The warship was a distinct design change from the Second Chance and the earlier scouts. She’d been built inside a single three-hundred-meter-long hull, shaped like a stretched teardrop, with eight blunt thermal radiator fins at the rear to complete the aerodynamic illusion. A crew of thirty were in command of a marque 4 hyperdrive, with a top speed of one light-year per hour; a seven-tier force field complemented with a locked molecule hull field; fifty missiles containing fifteen independent twenty-gee sub-warheads carrying hundred-megaton charges capable of diverted energy functions; and thirty directed energy beam weapons. To supply power for the hyperdrive and the combat systems, fifteen high-capacity niling d-sinks had been installed. Charging them up to flight readiness was now beyond the generator capacity of Kerensk, which was already supplying power for the entire scoutship fleet. CST was laying in superconductor power lines from other planets to supply the anticipated fleet. The construction of new generators was providing a bull market for power bonds right across the Commonwealth as entrepreneurs and existing utility companies bid to supply the navy with gigawatts.

Dauntless had disengaged right on time, small blue ion flames around her base pushing her slowly away from the open assembly platform. She’d curved around the High Angel, giving the people in the crystal domes a good view of her size and shape as she traversed Icalanise, before switching on her hyperdrive and vanishing in a burst of violet light.

“Three completed, another ten authorized,” Wilson had said as the big ship slipped over Babuyan Atoll. “Defenderis next out. She’s yours if you want her,” he told Oscar.

“Oh, I do. Yes, indeed, I truly do.”

Mac had laughed delightedly and congratulated his old friend. Then the pair of them had gone out and hit the town, such as it was in Babuyan Atoll, to toast the new command and the successful return.

Oscar groaned miserably as the express shot into strong lemon-yellow sunlight, which shone through the first-class carriage windows. He reached for his sunglasses.

“So where did you two finish up last night?” Antonia Clarke asked from the seat opposite.

“I have no goddamn idea,” Oscar grunted. “There was a band there. I think. Maybe jazz?” He picked up the cup of black coffee that the steward had just poured, looked at it, felt strange fluids start to churn in his stomach, and hurriedly put it down again.

Antonia laughed. She’d already had to baby-sit him through the freefall commuter flight from High Angel to the Kerensk wormhole station. Keeping his uniform clean under those circumstances had been tricky; then there had been the complaints from their fellow passengers.

“Have you got your speech ready?” she asked.

“Fuck off.”

“You want another tifi hit?”

“Look! Just shut—Oh, God, yes please.”

Grinning, she took out the packet of tubes and pressed one to his neck. There was a capacitor whine as the membrane pad on the end fast-tracked the drug into his bloodstream. “That’s your limit. No more for another six hours.”