The morning of June 17, on the eve of his scheduled press conference to
address the issue, Edgar Stone sat behind his desk in the Oval Office,
staring blankly at his fourth attempt to draft a reply to General
Hayes. Dark circles pulled at his eyes and sinuses; his head felt like
a warm stone that wouldn't think. Half an hour earlier, after
listening to his top advisers swear at each other with the same
arguments they had been postulating for months, he had done something
he would not have dreamed of in other circumstances. He had told them
all to "Shut up," and unceremoniously shown them the door.
For the first time in his presidency he was taking matters into his own
hands, with more than a few regrets and second thoughts. He had slept
badly or not at all for three nights running, and felt neither brave,
nor noble, nor even competent to make such a choice. In his current
frame of mind he was incapable of realizing the human or historical
significance of the crisis that lay before him, and at the moment this
was not what mattered. Unlike Hayes, he didn't give a damn what people
thought once he was dead, or even out of office. What mattered now was
that his tolerance for bullshit had been long since used up---that he
was furious at being put in such a position.
And somewhere, very deep inside himself he knew, though he shrank from
the knowledge, that something very wrong had happened, that the damage
was far from over, and that he was partly to blame. And he knew one
more thing, despite the rhetoric that he had spouted for two decades:
offensive war, unduly considered, was the basest and most shameful of
human endeavors, never justifiable, and rarely, in the end,
accomplishing anything.
Because for all his faults, and these he possessed in abundance, Edgar
Stone was not insane.
He bowed very low, crumpling the paper before him in both hands. Shook
his head mournfully. He pushed the com-button on his desk and summoned
a secretary, to whom he dictated his answer to Hayes.
*
The press conference was postponed without a future date being set, on
the pretext that new information had just come to light, which must be
relayed to the Secretary of State before further action could be taken.
But even the impassable Bill Miller, Stone's Press Secretary, could
not pull off this announcement without incurring a barrage of stupefied
questions and dissatisfied remarks.
And when news of the postponement spread, along with the undercurrent
of confusion and subdued alarm which accompanied it, even the dullest
Americans began to sense that something was amiss---that real life had
somehow crept onto the peaceful shores of their island. And nearly all
were aware of a strange thrill of fear as their President finally
stepped before the cameras on July 15, looking not at all like himself.
* * *
On June 24, the day that Hayes received the President's reply, the
Third Fleet was once again preparing to go into action. The
coordinates (and victim) of their next attack had already been decided
upon, known only to the General Staff, and to the scientists in charge
of constructing the star gate. All the myriad ships---destroyer
groups, flotillas and task forces, still intact---were once more
huddled within the massive body of the Supercarrier 'Dreadnought',
itself nearly forty kilometers from stem to stern.
The mother vessel, with all its destructive children tucked up inside,
and therefore vulnerable (relatively speaking) to sudden attack, had
been positioned by her masters in the place that this was least likely
to occur---a distant orbit around the sea planet Goethe, where Alliance
ships moved constantly, ready to repel any attempt at a counter-stroke
by the Coalition. The entrance to the star gate was being constructed
outside the extremities of the system, far beyond the considerable pull
of the massive star, Athena.
Though the two capitalist fleets remained in constant contact, it was
understood that there would be no mutual effort or coordinated defense
once the Dreadnought left the system. The two sides had gotten what
they wanted: the Belgians and Swiss the riches of the colonies, as
well as the threat of a powerful ally, and the Commonwealth, an easy
victory with a minimum of casualties. Thus the thief and the bully
would part.
Both sides, meanwhile, were concerned (at least Hayes pretended to be)
by the external calm and relative inaction on the part of the
Coalition, and the still more ominous silence of Soviet Space. In his
more lucid moments the Secretary realized the strength of his ultimate
foe: that a great bear waited for him deep in the woods, and that
killing it, even with the full weight of the Commonwealth behind him,
would be no easy task. But for now he feared nothing and no one.
ONE STEP AT A TIME, he told himself. One step at a time.
*
It was late afternoon, U.C. Earth time, though that measure seemed
quite meaningless while circling a planet of turbulent seas two hundred
times Earth's mass, dotted with tiny islands rising thousands of feet
above the wrack, itself revolving around a sun not to be spoken in the
same breath with our own.
Leif Janson felt this lapse of human significance acutely, as he paced
back and forth in Communications Room One, waiting for the approaching
message from the diminutive planet which had spawned him. Even aboard
the Dreadnought, dwarfed as it was by everything around it, this
feeling of smallness and mock importance would not leave him.
He recalled the words of Joseph Conrad, describing the way the primeval
forests of Africa must have looked upon the coming of the white man to
steal its ivory. "Fantastic invasion." And so it seemed to him now.
How could man even pretend to dominate such a Universe, in which his
unnoticed presence, lasting but the blink of an eye, could not begin to
compare with the Infinity which his mind could not even comprehend?
All that a man could ever hope to do was live in peace with himself,
and understanding with his neighbors. And of late the Commonwealth had
done a damned poor job of that. To find love, and to pass that love on
to his children.....
"Major Janson." He turned. "Message coming in."
"Good. Get it recorded then go below. Lieutenant Frye, contact the
Secretary and ask him to come down right away. Tell him the message is
in, and that I've cleared the com room. Then report to your quarters
and await further instructions."
"Yes sir."
Several minutes later Janson stood alone beside the main decoding
computer, listening to the drum of approaching footsteps. General
Hayes strode into the room with the same expression of confident,
aggressive attention that he always wore, perhaps pulled a bit tighter
about the cheekbones by tension and desire.
With him were two other men: Brigadier General Michael Calder, his
right-hand man for the last twenty years, and Gen-Admiral Frank,
commander of the Third Fleet, also a long-time associate. The
Secretary, choosing for the moment to don civilian clothes, addressed
the middle-aged (and therefore to his eyes, young) Communications
Officer directly.
"Well, Major. Is the message fully recorded? Have you followed my
instructions to the letter?"
"Yes sir. Shall I begin decoding?"
Janson held this important, sensitive post because of his high security
clearance, his steady, if not outstanding career, and most of all, his
ability not to speak of his work to anyone, anytime, under any
circumstances. Frank, therefore, saw nothing unusual in the question.
But Hayes looked hard at the man, as if searching for some tell-tale
flaw.
"What is your security clearance, major?"
"1-A, to military level Five, sir."
"And how many years have you served with us?"
"Twenty-three, sir."
"Then you saw action in the Manxsome conflict?"
"Yes sir."
"Decorated?"
"No sir."
Hayes turned to the Fleet Commander.
"Can you vouch for this man?"
"Yes, General." Hayes gave the man a last, hard look, almost a threat.