Augustus awoke as Piscivorous dropped out of the twisting nightmare of transit space at Luxor. Only the revenue barque they'd met at Faiyum was in her company now, the other galleases having taken alternate courses at Memphis and Faiyum respectively. Bungarus had been ordered to make way for Khartoum and then the Agfa Sector via Cairo and Semna. Naja was to head for Irkala and the Halonite Sector via Lagash and the passes. Piscivorous was also heading for Irkala, but by a more direct route: through Luxor and Aswan.
Markus lead his own command deftly to the orbital transfer station, where she was quickly made fast. There spacer first class Marvin McCormic disembarked to requisition supplies and fuel. In no time hoses were carrying their cargos of liquified deuterium and drinking water to the thirsty little ship, and able spacers were sweating that dearly bought water right back into the station atmosphere carrying crates heavy with frozen produce and dried proteins. When the ship her spacers affectionately called "fishbreath" cast off a bare six hours later few people noticed that McCormic's name was missing from the roster, just as able spacer Gergiev's had been after Memphis.
Bungarus was the first to go. Barely a week had passed since the battle of Kerberos. Two days out from Memphis she stopped for fuel at Cairo and that was her undoing. She'd cast off just before the rebels had arrived, their giant sensor domes looking for all the world like pale, festering boils on their ugly little galleons. The midget men at least had the dignity to paint their ship a sensible, warlike color; blood red, with a great glaring eye on each side of the prow. Lieuetenant Commander Peters thought about putting up a fight, but he was outgunned, outnumbered, and there was no way he'd beat them out of the system. He surrendered politely and hoped for the best.
Naja did fully a day better. She was tied up to the small station station above Nina in the Lagash system taking aboard what supplies were still on hand after the big boxer Ever Stoic had gobbled up most of what was there for her own journey through the passes.
Before Naja could depart two imperial ships dropped out of the warp into normal space. Their entrance was skilled and barely made a flash on the station's sensors. Two more flashes, brighter and further away, followed soon after. The bastards must have micro-jumped to conceal their approach. It was a tricky maneuver. The tahti had been known to do it, but never a human ship. Correction, two human ships; one at least a galleon. Commander Phillips cursed, but he wasn't going to follow the idiot advice of that damned priest. The station had already surrendered before he'd even keyed his mic, while he was still contemplating what order to give. That would mean he'd have to cut away the moorings to cast off, and that was difficult and dangerous work, particularly when exchanging shots with the orbital installation that you'd tied up to. He too ordered a surrender, and just hoped Mickelson had better luck aboard the jolly green giant that was Ever Stoic. She'd disappeared from the system just before the Rimmers arrived, if he was reading his display right.
Piscivorous was the last to go. She was well away from the station and about to make the transition into warp when a sensor tech cried out "Contacts azimuth one niner two, z plus fifteen, bearing roughly three six zero relative."
"I D?" asked Markus.
"They look to be Rimmers, sir. A heavy and an escort. Both stunties. The heavy is probably a light galleon or a caravel," the tech replied
"No real chance we can outgun that, then," Markus said. "Can we outrun them?"
"Ready for transit," the helmsman said calmly.
"Take us into the warp, we'll lose them there."
The light through the viewports shifted and shimmered, turning into the wild, rainbow quasi-unreality of transit space.
Almost immediately the sensor tech said "They've followed us. Must have matched our jump. Azimuth one eight ninner, z plus one four now. Still bearing roughly three six zero relative."
"Distance?" Markus asked.
"Fifteen mikes and closing."
Markus looked out through the bridge screen. There was a bit of weather ahead, a fog bank in the warp. If they departed the marked lane inside that and dropped into real space maybe they could ditch their tail.
"How far is that bank Edgar?" Markus said.
"Eight mikes, sir," the tech replied.
"Ensign Foster, be ready steer thirty degrees to port on my mark."
"Aye aye cap'n," he replied.
Markus waited tensely as they edged closer to the bank.
"Thirrteen mikes," said the sensor tech.
"Hold her steady," replied Markus. This would be a close one. "How far is that bank now?"
"A bit more than six mikes."
Good, thought Markus. At that rate they should still be close to seven mikes ahead when they hit the bank. That gave them plenty of room to maneuver. They waited as the tech called out numbers.
"Eleven mikes." Minutes ticked by. "Ten." No one even breathed audibly while the little galiot slid silently through space. "Nine mikes, sir." A hatch hissed open and then closed in the background. "Eight mikes."
"What's going on Markus?" asked inquisitor Augustus, choosing a particularly inconvenient moment to make his presence known.
"We're shaking a tail," Markus replied. "I'll need you to step out or keep quiet. This is a tricky maneuver."
"Seven mikes," the tech said calmly. "Still almost a mike to the bank," he said. "Must be drifting on the current."
It was going to be close, but it should still work. "Six mikes," the tech said, as prow of the little galiot cut into the warp fog. Markus held up his hand, forestalling questions.
"Now, Foster," he said. "Cut it thirty to port."
The little ship trembled as thruster fired, changing her trajectory. The surreality of the warp briefly parted in the plume around her fantail and then closed again in the distance.
"Okay Foster, dead ahead now. Let's get about a mike off the lane and then jump real."
They sailed silently through the not quite nothingness for tense seconds, almost a minute maybe, not seeing anything. "Now, Foster!" Markus barked.
Foster moved the engineroom telegraph to the realspace detent. The bridge screen darkened instantly to blot out the blaze of energy that accompanied the transfer back into real space. Anyone within a thousand mikes would see them as a brief, small sun flashing into existence, but they were pretty far from any known world, so most likely no one would ever see anything.
A moment later they were blinded by a second flash, and a third. The bridge screen wasn't properly calibrated to deal with any but its own transfer. It darkened quickly enough to prevent damage, but not fast enough to keep the bridge crew from a moment of disorientation and confusion. The damned stunties had matched their jump again, in deep space, off the marked star lanes, in a fog bank.
Augustus screamed "What the hell will you do about that?"
The com tech interrupted. "We're being hailed, sir," he said. "We've been instructed to power down our transfer unit and await boarding."
"Fire on them, captain!" Augustus practically screamed.
"No, thank you," said Markus calmly. "We can't even penetrate their screens. I've seen what those things can do."
"Weren't you listening at Memphis?" Augustus said.
"Not really," Markus replied. "You weren't talking sense. I mostly tuned it out."
"What?" Augustus shouted in disbelief. "You're relieved of duty! His majesty has no use for cowards."
No one reacted, save for the captain.
"Chief," he said, turning to a large, burly spacer, "Would you show our guest to his quarters? He'll be moving to 402 C 6," he said, describing the brig by its frame, deck, and compartment.
"With pleasure, sir," he said. His hand was on his sidearm, but he left it holstered. "Come with me, Inquisitor. We'll see to it that your comfortable, at least."
. . . . .
A short time later two Burgkhan Kaldun marines in glittering exo-suits walked through the same hatch Augustus had recently vacated. Their accents were thick, but they spoke High Galactic clearly enough, and Markus found them to be eminently reasonable as captors went. Maybe the worst of the propaganda was overblown. They weren't really aliens, he though. Just humans who tended to the short and squat. Maybe the Tahti were worse. Certainly the greenies were savage beasts, barely able to speak coherently. (It was a wonder they were a spacefaring species.) But the stunties might not be so bad as captors went. It was said even the Emperor permitted them into his presence occasionally, when the need arose. But what of stunties that associated with poncies and greenies? Markus supposed that he was about to find out.
. . . . .
Inspector Nguyen interupted Colorado with a polite knock. "Reports from the front, Madame Secretary."
"Oh?" she said. "What do they say?"
"I haven't read them," he replied. "Eyes only. Here," he said, handing her a sealed envelope.
Nguyen stepped out and Rex-Avis broke the security seal. Her face brightened as she read the flimsies. Excellent!
"Inspector Nguyen, can you get me a secure line to Commodus?"
"Of course ma'am," he said, nodding slightly as he stepped away.
A few minutes later he returned with a com-set, that he assembled and coded for the Proserpine relay. A uniformed agent appeared on the other end and he said "Secretary Rex-Avis for Lord Whye on a secure line."
"Let me transfer you to his garden," the agent said. A moment later the grizzled old councilor appeared on the viewscreen, looking relaxed.
"You got the news, I see?"
"We've got them on the back foot, Chris! Caught them in the cookie jar. I'm thinking this might be the perfect time to make a move in force, see if we can't rally some of the Memphians to the cause."
"Otto warned against extending our lines too much, but there's a couple of places we could really slow the Imperials down if we had to. Have him draw up plans for a military incursion and I'll see what we can accomplish with diplomacy," he said. "Incidentally, I hate to ask, but how are the funeral arrangements going?"
Colorado sighed. "I'd wanted to have a small, private affair, but I'm told you can't do that for war heroes." She paused, fighting sudden tears.
"No," Christos said gently.
