Fleet of the Damned (Sten #4). Allan Cole

over the picnic grounds as the waldo cooks followed his motions. Usually, this was the time when the Emperor would settle back for a lazy basting: a beer for him, a brush of sauce for the meat.

      It was also a time when he pretended great indifference to the rapturous faces of his guests. His mood blackened as he saw the sea of faces tight and worried.

      What were the Tahn doing, anyway? Intelligence was zilch. Mercury Corps had never been the same since he had promoted Mahoney.

      “Clotting Mahoney,” he said aloud. “Where the hell is he when I need him?”

      The voice came from just behind him. “Fetching you a beer, Your Highness.”

      It was Major General Ian Mahoney, commanding general, First Guards Division. He clutched two mugs overflowing with foam.

      “What the clot are you doing here? You weren’t invited.”

      “Arranged some leave, sir. Perks of being your own CG. Thought you wouldn’t mind.”

      “Hell, no. If you’re gonna sneak up on a man, I always say, do it with beer.”

      CHAPTER FOUR

      MAHONEY WIPED THE last of the sauce off his plate with the thick stub of garlic bread, bit into the bread, and sighed. He took a deep honk of beer and then squeegeed the plate with the rest of the bread. He popped it down and settled back.

      The Eternal Emperor, who’d barely touched his own plate, was watching him with great interest.

      “Well?” he said.

      “Heaven,” Mahoney said. He took another sip of beer. “Excuse me. Heaven, sir.”

      The Emperor took a small bite from his own plate, frowning. “Maybe a bit too much cumin this time.”

      Mahoney gave a deep belch. He looked at the Emperor inquiringly, and the man passed his nearly full plate over to Mahoney, who shoveled in a mouthful of satisfying proportions.

      “No. Not too much cumin,” the Emperor said. He leaned his chair back to catch the last warm light of the sun. The Eternal Emperor appeared to be a man much younger than Mahoney. Midthirties, perhaps.

      Heavily muscled—like an ancient decathlon champion. He let the sun soak in, waiting to hear Mahoney’s real purpose. Finally, Mahoney took one more swig of beer, wiped his lips, straightened his tunic, and sat up in near attention in his seat.

      “Your Majesty,” he said, “I respectfully request permission to deploy the First Guards in the Fringe Worlds.”

      “Really,” the Eternal Emperor said. “The Fringe Worlds? I suppose you’re worrying about the Tahn.”

      Mahoney just looked at his boss. By now, he occasionally knew when he was being toyed with.

      “Yes, sir. The Tahn.”

      The Eternal Emperor could not help sweeping the picnic grounds with his eyes. The few guests who had bothered to show had left early, and the waiter bots were already cleaning up. In half an hour the area would be pristine—all broad lawns and rare azaleas.

      The Eternal Emperor pointed to one of the flowering bushes.

      “You know how many years I worked on those, Mahoney?”

      “No, sir.”

      “Too many. The things love dry climates. Aussie deserts, that kind of drakh.”

      “Aussie, Your Majesty?”

      “Never mind. Point is, I hate clotting flowers. Can’t eat the SOBs. What’s the damned use of them? I say.”

      “Exactly, sir. What’s the use of them?”

      The Eternal Emperor plucked a flower from a nearby bush and began stripping it, petal by petal.

      “What do you think they’re up to? The Tahn, I mean.”

      “With all due respect, Your Majesty, I think they’re getting ready to kick our rosy red behinds.”

      “No drakh. What the clot you think I’ve been doing?”

      The Emperor pulled the handle of a keg and sudsed more beer into his glass. He started to drink, then set the glass down. He thought for a while, making endless concentric rings that cut in on each other again and again.

      “The trouble, Mahoney,” he finally said, “is that I got a clot more to move than the Tahn. Just to hold what I have, I have to double my fleet. For a counterattack, I need another third. For a full assault, twice more.

      “A thousand years ago or so, I swore I’d never come to this. Silliness. Too big. Too much to protect.

      “My, God, do you know how long it takes to bid out a simple ship contract nowadays?”

      Mahoney, wisely, didn’t answer.

      “I tried to make up for it,” the Emperor continued, “by creating the best intelligence corps in history.

      “And what the hell do I get? I get drakh.”

      “Yes, sir,” Mahoney said.

      “Oh, do I hear a scent of admonishment in that, General? Criticism for your promotion?”

      “And transfer, sir.”

      “And transfer,” the Emperor said. “Under normal circumstances I would have said that I need a little disapproval in my life. Disapproval, properly put, keeps an Eternal Emperor on his toes.”That’s the theory, anyway. Can’t really say. Don’t have any other bosses of my type to rely on.”Mahoney had found the proper moment. “Who can you rely on, sir?”There was silence. The Emperor watched the plates being swabbed, the forks being scrubbed, and the tables being put away. Besides the workers, the Emperor and Mahoney were the only two left. Mahoney finally tired of waiting on the Emperor’s next move.

      “About my request, sir. First Guards, Fringe Worlds?”

      “I need to know more,” the Emperor said. “I need to know enough to buy a great deal of time.”

      “Then it’s the First Guards, sir?”

      The Emperor pushed his glass aside.

      “No. Request refused, General.”

      Mahoney almost bit his tongue through, trying to keep back his logical response. Silence, again, was the wiser course.

      “Find out for me, Mahoney, before you tell me I’ve missed a bet,” the Eternal Emperor said.

      Mahoney did not ask how.

      The Emperor rose, leaving his nearly full glass.

      “I guess the barbecue’s over,” he said.

      “I suppose so, sir.”

      “Funny. All those no-shows. I imagine most of my alleged allies are thinking deeply about what kind of a deal to make with the Tahn. In case I lose.”The Eternal Emperor was wrong about that. The time for thinking was long past.

      CHAPTER FIVE

      PHASE ONE OF Imperial Flight Training was on the vacation world of Salishan. Sten and his fellow pilots-to-be motlied together at a reception center, broken down into thirty-being companies, and were told to stand by for shipment to the base itself.

      The trainees ranged from fresh-out-of-basic men and women, to graduates of one or another of the civilian-run preparatory schools that fed into the navy, to a scattering of already serving officers and enlisted people. Mostly they were military virgins, Sten noted by the absence of decorations, the untailored newly issued semidress uniforms, and the overly stiff bearing that the conditioning process had ground into them.

      But Sten could have been blind and known that his classmates were fresh meat.

      As they waited for the gravsled, there was excited speculation—because they were on a rec-world, this should be easy duty. They should be