Honor Harrington (№5) - Flag In Exile

Reverend Hanks settled into the seat beside her as his rank demanded, and she shook her head.

"It would be a lot simpler to just go straight to Austin City," she observed quietly, and he snorted.

"And violate a thousand years of tradition, My Lady? Never! A steadholder flies to the capital in his, or her, official vehicle from his, or her, official residence. Tester only knows what would happen if we suggested that the practice can be a bit, um, inefficient!"

"Even if it means spending two extra hours each way in an air car?"

"I will agree your steading's distance from Austin makes it a bit more difficult, My Lady, but that's all I'm prepared to agree to. Someone might report me if I admitted anything more."

Honor laughed and then leaned back in her seat as the pinnace abruptly shivered. The mechanical docking arms unlatched, and the pilot drifted the small craft free on a gentle puff of belly thrusters, then backed out of the bay stern-first. Undocking was a routine maneuver, but he accomplished it with an effortless grace, and Honor nodded in approval as he turned the pinnace's nose planetward.

"We're late," Taylor said, and Martin nodded tensely. Brother Marchant's followers had done unbelievably well to assemble all they needed for the mission as quickly as they had, but they'd had to duplicate Harrington uniforms, paint an air car in official Harrington colors, and cobble up IDs that could pass muster. Without the practice they'd had preparing covers for the people they'd inserted into the Sky Domes crews they could never have gotten it done in time.

Only, Martin thought, glaring at the dash chrono, they hadn't done it in time, not quite. The blur of surf that marked the rocky northern headlands of Goshen was still invisible in the darkness ahead of them, and the flight plan one of the Burdette Space Facility controllers had pulled from Orbital Control gave them less than eighty more minutes to get into position. They'd need seventy of those minutes just to reach Harrington Space Facility, and if they hit even the slightest delay getting onto the grounds...

"We'll never get the car through the traffic control points in time. We'll have to go to the backup plan and ditch it at the west gate," he said, thinking aloud for Austin's benefit. Taylor nodded tautly. HSF was Grayson's newest space facility. It was over ten kilometers from Harrington City, and the usual clutter of service establishments only just now growing up around it was concentrated to the east, between it and the steading's capital.

"I don't like leaving the car," the younger man said after a pause. "The launcher's going to be pretty obvious, Ed."

"Then we'll just have to be sure no one sees us," Martin replied, trying to coax a little more speed from his turbines as the coastline finally appeared before them.

The ride down was taking longer than usual because of who the pinnace's passengers were. Orbital Control had cleared a special security corridor for it, and its flight path had been planned for a gentle atmospheric insertion, but Honor rather wished they'd opted for a shorter flight, even at the expense of a little roughness. She needed to meet with Sky Domes' other engineers before she left for Steadholders' Hall, and time was short, but there was no point fretting over what couldn't be changed, she reminded herself.

Martin and Taylor parked their air car in a bay just out of sight of the west personnel gate and took the time to lock it. Its interior didn't match a real HSG car's, and they couldn't risk someone noticing that and sounding an alarm.

The ex-sergeant glanced at his chrono and swore softly as he pocketed the keys. He'd gotten a little more speed out or the car than he'd hoped, but they had less than twelve minutes to get into position, and that was cutting things too tight. He felt a moment of panic, but then he forced it down. They were about God's work. He would see to it that they met His schedule.

"Give me your ID," he said. Taylor handed the folio over, and Martin drew his own from his breast pocket. "Stay behind me and try to keep your body between the guard and the launcher."

"I'll try, Ed, but..."

Martin nodded. The weapon was one of the accursed Manticorans' latest designs, there was a certain sweetness in that thought, for a portable, shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missile, and like all such weapons, it used its own impeller wedge rather than a warhead to destroy its target. Of course, the drive which could be crammed into a portable weapon produced a wedge smaller than those of larger vehicle or aircraft-mounted missiles, which reduced its lethal zone and put a correspondingly greater premium on accuracy. But it also meant the weapon was small enough that its carrying case could, barely, be forced into an outsized civilian carryall. That, unfortunately, was a mixed blessing, since armsmen had no business carrying civilian luggage on duty. Well, if the gate guard pressed the point they could always claim Austin was delivering it for a friend before he checked in.

He drew a deep breath and headed for the personnel gate at the best pace he could manage without looking too obviously hurried. If I find myself too busy to remember You properly, Lord, he prayed silently, do not forget me. I am about Your work. Guide me, that my actions may save Your people from sin and damnation.

Honor glanced back out the view port. Even in the darkness, she saw water gleaming below and recognized the Goshen Sea. Good! The diamond-shaped sea cut deep into the continent of the same name from the northwest, and Harrington City lay at its eastern end. If the sea was below her, she'd be home in another ten minutes, so perhaps she'd have time for that meeting after all.

The single guard was even younger than Austin, an armsman first class, but so new he squeaked, and that was good, for Martin wore a captain's insignia. It was a higher rank than he'd ever expected to hold, but coupled with his age, it should make him a reassuringly senior presence and help defuse any doubts the youngster might have.

"Good evening, Armsman," he said briskly as he stepped fully into the illumination cast by the gate lights.

"Good evening, Sir!" The PFC snapped to attention and saluted, and Martin returned it.

"Lonely out here," he remarked as he handed over the two ID folios.

"Yes, Sir, it is," the Harrington replied. He opened the first ID and glanced at it, then looked up to match Martin's face to it. "Lonely, I mean," he went on as he closed Martin's ID and opened Taylor's, "but my re..."

He paused suddenly, and Martin's belly tensed as he looked up. Austin had stepped into the light, he'd had no choice but to come forward so the Harrington could check his face against his ID, and the carryall was damnably evident. The sentry gazed at it for a moment, then shrugged and looked back down at the ID, and Martin relaxed... only to tense anew as the Harrington stiffened. The youngster was looking at him now, and then his eyes flipped back to Austin. Not at the carryall this time, but at something else.

At, Martin suddenly realized, Austins gun belt. His own eyes dropped to the Harrington's sidearm, and his jaw tightened as he saw the sleek, lethal pulser. It was a modern weapon, too expensive for most steadholders to have reequipped their armsmen with... and totally unlike the old-fashioned machine pistols he and Austin carried.

This possibility had occurred to none of their planners, it was always the simple damned things that tripped people up, but he didn't take time to think about it. The Harrington had just started to step back, his own mind still grappling with the implications of what his eye had seen but his brain had not yet fully assimilated, when Martin struck.

There was no time to be gentle, and his eyes were hard as his knuckles smashed into the young armsman's throat. The Harrington's head flew back with a horrible, choking gurgle. His hands went to his throat in an involuntary reflex of agony, and Martin carried through with the attack. The young man was probably already dying of a crushed larynx, a corner of his mind told him, but his right leg swept the Harrington's feet from under him and his hands darted out. They caught the sentry's head and twisted explosively against the angle of his fall, and the sharp, crunching snap of a broken neck was shockingly loud in the silent night.

"Shit!" Taylor whispered, and Martin shot him a glare. This was no time for obscenity, he thought, and knew even as he did what a stupid thing it was to think.

He lowered the twitching body gently, smelling the sewer smell of a death-relaxed sphincter, and grimaced as he dragged the corpse out of the light. It was cruel how death robbed even the best men of dignity, and a heartfelt stab of remorse went through him. This young man had served a sinful mistress, but that was hardly his fault, and he'd done his duty well.

"May God forgive me, and you," he whispered to the corpse, then beckoned sharply to Taylor and led the way through the gate.

"Five minutes, My Lady," the flight engineer announced, and Honor nodded.

"It'll be nice to get down, My Lady." Hanks sighed beside her. "I mean no disrespect, but I've lived on a planet all my life, and while your flagship is a splendid vessel, I prefer solid ground under my feet."

The position wasn't perfect, but it was the best Martin could expect to find, and it wasn't as if they had to worry about target identification. The harlot was Harrington's Steadholder, all other traffic in and out of HSF had been shut down for fifteen minutes on either side of her arrival as a security measure, and they knew the bearing from which her pinnace would approach.

The ex-sergeant went down on one knee in the dense, black shadow of the parked air lorry, pistol in hand, and scanned the field nervously while Taylor unpacked the missile and attached the sighting unit to the launcher.

Senior Corporal Anthony Whitehead, HSG, was in a hurry. All the scurrying about to prepare for the Steadholder's arrival had delayed him, and he was over fifteen minutes late for the gate change. He had no doubt Armsman Sully wondered where the hell he was, and he couldn't blame the kid.

He half-jogged around the last bend, the better to show Sully that even NCOs were aware of their obligations, then slowed to a halt, and his sympathy disappeared into instant anger. Damn it to hell, where was he? Just because a man's relief was a little late was no reason to go dashing off and leave his post unguarded! When he got his hands on that young twerp, he'd...

His mental tirade broke off as his cognitive processes caught up with his instant anger. Frederick Sully was no "twerp." Young, yes, but well trained and sharp. He'd made Afc in record time, and Whitehead and his platoon sergeant had their eyes on him for further promotion. There was no way Sully would just wander off with the entire facility on a heightened alert level. Feelings were running high, and the Steadholder's armsmen had no intention of taking chances with her life.

But if he hadn't wandered, then...

The corporal snatched out his com.

"Security alert! This is Corporal Whitehead at Gate Five! I've just arrived on-site, and there's no sign of the sentry!" Something poked at his mind, and he scowled, then swore as something he'd seen without seeing it flashed through his brain. "Central, Whitehead. There's an HSG air car parked out here on the hangar apron, Bay Seven-Niner-Three. Was that cleared?"

His answer was the sudden, strident howl of security alarms throughout the facility.

"Sweet Tester!" Taylor gasped as sirens began to scream, and Martin bit back a matching expletive as he remembered what the dead guard had said. It was lonely, "but my re..." His relief, of course!

"W-What do we d-do, Ed?" Taylor stuttered, and the ex-sergeant gave him a steady look.

"We do God's work," he said quietly through the alarms' howl, "and if it's His will that we escape alive, we do that, too. Arm your launcher."

Master Chief Coxswain Gilbert Troubridge was Navy, not a member of the Harrington Guard, but the GSN did not encourage its pilots to take chances with the safety of flag officers. More to the point, Troubridge was as aware as anyone of the high state of tension on the planet, and his com was tied into both the HSF and HSG nets.

"Security alert?" He turned in his seat to glare at the com tech. "What kind of security alert, damn it?"

"I don't know, Gil," the rating replied tautly. "Some HSG corporal just came up on the air. Something about an unguarded gate."

"Shit!" The pinnace was already on final. If he had to abort, his counter-grav could take him up like a homesick meteor, but with no more information than he had, he couldn't know if that was necessary. Or, for that matter, a good idea.

Master Chief Troubridge made a decision. A Fleet pinnace's active tactical sensors would play hell with HSF's navigation and control systems, but he had an admiral who also happened to be a steadholder onboard.

His finger stabbed a button on his flight console.

"Seeking... seeking ... seeking..." Taylor's singsong chant sawed at Martin's nerves, but he forced himself not to shout at the younger man to be silent. Neither of them was likely to live another ten minutes, and he would not go to God having cursed a man seeking to do His will.

"Acquisition!" Taylor cried suddenly, and squeezed the stud.

"Missile launch, zero-zero-ten!" Troubridge's copilot shouted, and the master chiefs belly turned to frozen lead. Impeller drive. Had to be from the acceleration. Coming up at over forty degrees.

The data snapped into his brain, and he knew there was no way he could climb out of its path. In fact, there was only one thing he could do.

He killed the counter-grav and dove straight for the ground.

"Sweet Tester!" the senior controller in HSF Flight Ops gasped. There was no exhaust flare from an impeller-drive missile, and his instrumentation was too badly hashed by the pinnace's sensor emissions for him to tell precisely where it had come from, but he knew what it was, and he stabbed a button that dropped his mike into the HSF security net as well as its link to Lady Harrington's pinnace.

"SAM launch, somewhere on the west approach apron!"

"My God, at the Steadholder?" someone else shouted from behind him, but the controller didn't even look up. His horrified eyes were locked to the pinnace's plunging radar return.

Honor's head flew up as the pinnace suddenly lurched, then fell heavily off to port and dove vertically. For a moment she thought the pilot had lost it, but then she heard the scream of air-breathing turbines rammed to full power and realized the pinnace was still veering sharply left. It was an intentional maneuver, but why...?

Nimitz reared up in her lap, and she locked her arms about him, then bent her body across his in instant, protective reaction. She freed one arm from the cat to reach out and jerk Reverend Hanks' head down, and that was absolutely all she could do.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

In technical terms, what Master Chief Troubridge was trying to do was generate a miss. In layman's terms, he was deliberately crashing his own pinnace in a desperation bid to drop out of the SAM's acquisition envelope... and praying he could recover in the instant before he hit the ground and killed everyone on board himself. It was a virtually impossible maneuver, but Gil Troubridge was very, very good, and he almost managed it.

Almost.

He had to pull up, and he hauled the nose desperately back, riding his abused, howling turbines and air foils and simultaneously throwing in the counter-grav, but he was perhaps one meter low, and the pinnace's tail slammed into the ground. The impact snapped the sleek craft almost straight upright, but it didn't quite go over. For an instant it hung there, and Troubridge felt a moment of terrible relief. His copilot had gotten the emergency landing skids deployed. When the bird came down on them, it would be all...

That was when the SAM executed its terminal attack run.

The small, high-tech kamikaze had lost its target when Troubridge dove for the deck, but its seekers had reacquired lock, and it came slashing in at over ten kilometers per second. Even so, the pilot had almost denied it a hit, and its impeller wedges leading edge caught the pinnaces rearing nose one bare meter aft of the radome.

A guillotine of gravitic energy slammed through the fuselage like an axe through butter, and the raw kinetic energy of the impact tore the first ten meters of the pinnace apart. Troubridge, his copilot, and his com tech died instantly, and the impact energy completed what the tail strike had begun. The dying pinnace twisted impossibly, snapping all the way up and over, then slammed into the ground like a dolphin arcing backwards into the water. But it was no dolphin, and the spaceport approaches were paved with forty centimeters of ceramacrete that was much, much harder than water.

"Oh, dear God, she's down," the controller whispered. "My God, my God, she's down!"

Emergency vehicles were screaming into the night, and he stared through the tower's windows in horror as his Steadholder's disintegrating pinnace porpoised across the parking apron on its back.

Had it been a civilian shuttle, everyone aboard would have died with the flight deck crew, but the pinnace was a naval craft, intended for high-threat environments. Its armored hull was built of battle steel, and the people who'd designed it had produced the most crash-survivable vehicle their technology could build.

Number two turbine ripped free, rocketed across the field, and slammed into a fuel tanker, and a huge, blue fireball spalled the night. The tanker's driver never even knew he was dead, and his ground-effect vehicle blew sideways into Service Bay Twelve. Two atmospheric passenger buses and eighteen technicians were torn apart in the resultant explosion, and the pinnace slithered, onward in a screaming shower of sparks and shredded alloy.

The hydrogen reservoirs went next, but they, too, were designed to be crash-survivable, and jettisoning charges hurled them away from the splintering fuselage before they could explode. They fell like bombs, and, mercifully, three of them landed in empty, open space. The fourth slammed into the main terminal, and the staggering concussion when it blew turned a thousand square meters of exterior wall to shrapnel and sent it shrieking through the civilians in Concourse B. Two crash vehicles narrowly survived the explosion of another of the tanks square in their path, but their crews had no time to waste on their miraculous survival, and they reefed around in hairpin turns to charge after the disintegrating pinnace.

Honor grunted in anguish as something smashed into her right side. She sensed more than felt something else coming and instinctively angled her own body to the left to protect Reverend Hanks' frail, ancient bones just as a hammer-like impact slammed into her. She heard the Reverend cry out in pain as her shoulder was driven into him, and someone screamed from the rear of the cabin. The terrible sound of agony cut off with even more terrible suddenness, and me world cartwheeled and spun and shook about her in a lightning nightmare that somehow seemed to last forever.

But then, miraculously, the pinnace slammed back over onto its belly and was still. She heard groans and strange, thick-voiced shouts around her and thrust herself upright. The overhead luggage rack had come down, that must have been what Knocked her into Hanks, but it had broken completely loose from its brackets, and her Sphinx-bred muscles heaved it aside. Her hands were already feeling for Nimitz, assuring herself she hadn't lost her grip and that he was uninjured, even as she turned her head to look for the Reverend.

He was alive, and relief flooded her as he shook his head dazedly. He'd cut his forehead and bloodied his mouth, but there was intelligence in his eyes, and concern for her, she noticed, as she fought her way clear of the air bag which had automatically deployed from the bulkhead in front of her.

"My Lady! Lady Harrington!" She didn't know how LaFollet had gotten there so soon, but his arm darted out as she came unsteadily upright. The pain in her right side told her she had at least one broken rib, and more pain said her left shoulder was damaged, as well, but those were minor, distant thoughts, for she smelled the actinic stink of an electrical fire.

"Off! Get everybody off, now!" she shouted. The hydrogen reservoirs must have separated properly, or they'd all have been dead, but the emergency thrusters were another matter. Designed for a last-ditch effort to land a battle-damaged pinnace in one piece, their tankage was buried deep inside the hull. The fuel lines were filled with inert gas under normal flight conditions, and the tanks themselves were heavily armored in near-indestructible alloy, but nothing was truly indestructible. Hands grabbed her, and she turned her head as LaFollet literally yanked her off her feet and threw her at Jamie Candless. The younger armsman's face was cut and bloody, but he caught her and turned instantly for the nearest rent in the hull.

"Don't worry about me! Help Adam!" The fuselage's starboard side had been ripped wide open, and Gerrick twisted weakly, moaning with pain. One leg was snapped back at an unnatural angle, trapped under the mangled base of his seat. Splintered bone thrust from a bloodsoaked thigh, and more blood pulsed from a deep wound in his shoulder.

"Let me go, help Adam!" she shouted again, but Jamie Candless was a Grayson armsman whose Steadholder was in danger. She twisted in his grip, but he hauled her grimly towards the hole in the null, despite her greater height and strength, and someone else appeared on her other side.

Arthur Yard gripped her other arm, tearing it free of Nimitz, but the cat's arms were about her neck, and he clung to her like a limpet. Between them, Yard and Candless dragged her bodily from the pinnace while Andrew LaFollet bent over Reverend Hanks behind her. His life was even more important to Grayson than the Steadholder’s, and there was no time to worry about any injuries the old man might have. The major yanked him to his feet, flung him over his shoulders in a fireman's carry, and charged after his Steadholder.

Honor heaved madly, but her armsmen refused to let her go and ran desperately towards the shelter of a nearby drainage culvert.

She twisted her head and saw LaFollet right behind her with Hanks while Jared Sutton brought up the rear. Her flag lieutenant seemed intact, though he was obviously dazed, but there was no sign of the pinnace's crew. The cockpit crew couldn't possibly have survived, but where was the engineer? Then she remembered the chopped off terrible scream, and she knew.

Candless and Yard reached the culvert and flung her flat in the deep ditch it served, and Candless threw his body over hers. His weight crushed her down on Nimitz, and she writhed out from under him. He tried to drag her back, but an elbow slammed into his belly with the precision of thirty-six years of unarmed combat training. It didn't even occur to Honor that he was trying to save her life. All she could think of was Adam. She started back, only to go down as Yard tackled her bodily from behind, and LaFollet dropped Reverend Hanks less gently than the old man's years deserved and flung himself into the struggle to restrain his Steadholder's insane charge back into the wreckage.

"No, My Lady! We can't risk you!"

"I’ll go, My Lady!" Sutton had gotten his mind working again, and he dashed back towards the pinnace, his soul writhing in shame as he realized he'd left an injured man trapped while he ran. Candless was still clutching his belly and whooping in agony from Honors elbow strike, and the other armsmen had all they could do to keep her from following her lieutenant without injuring her themselves.

"No, goddamn it!" LaFollet screamed in her face, and the sheer shock of hearing him swear did what all his physical efforts could not. She froze, staring into his wild gray eyes and panting, and only then noticed the tears flowing down his face. "We can't risk you!" he half-sobbed, shaking her in his fear for her. "Don't you understand that?"

"He's right, My Lady." Reverend Hanks hobbled over to her. He favored his left leg and his face was blood-streaked, but his voice was unnaturally calm, almost gentle, and that gave it even more weight than LaFollet's passionate plea. "He's right," the Reverend said again, even more quietly, and she slumped in her armsmen's.

"All right," she whispered.

"Give me your word, My Lady," LaFollet demanded. She looked at him, and he managed a strained caricature of a smile. "Give me your word you'll stay here, stay here!, and we'll go back after Mr. Gerrick."

"I give you my word," she said dully. He stared into her eyes for one more moment, then released her and jerked his head at Yard, and the two of them started climbing back up out of the ditch.

"Did we get them? Did we get them?" Taylor demanded, and Martin shook his head irritably.

"I don't know."

He stood upright, staring out across the field. He'd been certain, at first, that all the explosions and fire meant they'd succeeded, but now he saw the battered, buckled pinnace, not fifty meters away, looming against a backdrop of flame as the first rescue vehicle slammed to a halt beside it. The damage was terrible yet not total, and it was just possible some of the passengers had survived.

He looked around and, despite his faith, swallowed a thick, choking bolus of fear. There were other ground cars out there now, not rescue vehicles, but HSG patrol cars, sweeping directly towards Austin and him. He looked the other way and saw still more of them, closing in along the sides of an isosceles triangle with the wreckage at its base.

"We're not going to get out, Austin," he said, and the calmness of his own voice surprised him. Taylor stared at him for a moment, his mouth working, then dropped the empty launcher with a sigh.

"I guess not," he said with a matching calm, and Martin nodded.

"In that case, I think we should make certain we accomplished what we came for."

LaFollet and Yard heaved themselves out of the ditch, whose side seemed far steeper than it had when they'd dragged their Steadholder down it, and Honor stood beside Reverend Hanks. Enough sanity had returned for her to realize Andrew and the Reverend were right. She was who she was, and she could no longer rush into avoidable danger. Too many people depended upon her for too much, but the acceptance was bitter, bitter poison on her tongue while she watched her armsmen start back towards the pinnace. Nimitz crooned to her, sharing her wretched sense of shame as she let duty hold her back, and Reverend Hanks rested one hand on her shoulder in silent understanding.

Jamie Candless coughed and shoved himself to his knees, and Honor shook her head and knelt beside him.

"Sorry, Jamie," she said with true contrition, and he shook his head.

"Not... not a bad hit, My Lady," he gasped with something like a smile, and she set Nimitz down to help him to his feet. The cat scampered up to the lip of the ditch and perched there, watching the wreckage and the rescue workers he was far too small to help, and Honor slid an arm around Candless' shoulders. He muttered something and leaned against her, something he would never have done if he hadn't been all but out on his feet, and the two of them turned to look at the wreckage.

Emergency personnel moved with trained, desperate haste. Half a dozen charged straight into the wreckage, looking for survivors, while others pumped thick, white foam over the wreckage, and she recognized the green-on-green uniforms of two more guardsmen running towards her. They must be from the HSF detachment, she thought as they circled wide of the pinnace and dashed in her direction, and wondered how they'd gotten here so quickly.

"There! By the culvert!" Martin hissed, and heard Taylor growl something foul as they saw the tall, slim figure in the deep ditch. The roaring flames struck glittering splinters from the golden key and star about her throat, and the two of them ran even faster, desperate to reach her before a real armsman challenged them.

LaFollet and Yard had gotten no more than twenty meters from the ditch when it happened, and only the fact that they were both looking at the wreck saved their lives.

The hole in the propellant tank wasn't large... but enough fumes had finally gathered inside the hull, where the fire-suppressing foam hadn't quite reached in time. The first, brief warning was a lurid sheet of flame, shooting up out of the wreckage like some obscenely beautiful fan of scarlet and gold and blue, and both armsmen flung themselves flat a fraction of a second before the world blew apart.

The concussion threw Honor, Candless, and Hanks from their feet, and Honor's face went whiter than bone as Adam Gerrick, Jared Sutton, and forty-two HSF rescue personnel were turned from living human beings to so much seared and shredded flesh. She felt the thermal bloom reaching out over the ditch, heard the shriek of flying metal, and loss and guilt worse than any agony of the flesh smashed through her as the explosion hurled her to the ground.