The entire process lasted for more than eight hours, so that when the sun fi?nally reemerged over the eastern horizon, all of the POWs were still on their feet. Those who were ill, or too exhausted to remain vertical without assistance, were held upright lest they attract the wrong sort of attention.
Like those around her, Vanderveen was exhausted—so tired that she found herself drifting off to sleep at times. Short periods during which the diplomat was magically transported to other planets, and during one especially pleasant interlude on LaNor, found herself wrapped in Antonio Santana’s arms. But that brief moment of pleasure came to an end when President Nankool elbowed her ribs.
“Christina!” the chief executive hissed. “Wake up!”
The foreign service offi?cer brought her head up, forced her eyes to open, and soon wished she hadn’t as the mass punishments began. Because in Commandant Mutuu’s eyes, the prisoners, those who had destroyed his guard tower, and the Confederacy of Sentient Beings were all part of the same evil organism.
This philosophy was explained to the assembled multitude by no less a personage than Mutuu himself, as his sword-wielding mate made his way through the ranks of ragged prisoners and chose those who were about to die according to criteria known only to him.
Vanderveen felt her stomach muscles tighten as the Ramanthian made his way down her row, ignored Nankool, and paused directly in front of her. Was this it? the diplomat wondered. And, all things considered, would death come as a welcome relief? Perhaps that was why the human drew herself up and looked the War Mutuu right in one of his space black eyes as the bug’s antennae turned this way and that. But, for reasons known only to the Ramanthian, it wasn’t Vanderveen’s day to die. Nor any other member of the LG, although Schell came close when the naval offi?cer tried to intercede on behalf of his sailors and marines. Nine out of the ten individuals selected for punishment made their way to the front of the formation under their own power, accepted the shovels that were handed to them, and began to dig. Only one man, a sick sailor, tried to resist. He screamed, fl?ailed about, and was summarily shot. Then, with the same calm demeanor demonstrated earlier, the War Mutuu selected another victim, who was led up front to join the rest.
What made the moment especially poignant for Nankool was the fact that not one of those selected for execution attempted to obtain leniency by revealing the president’s identity. Tears streamed down the chief executive’s face, and at one point he made as if to go forward and join the men and women who were digging the communal grave, only to have Vanderveen and Calisco hold him back. It took the better part of an hour for the ten prisoners to dig a hole large enough to contain all of their bodies. Then, having been lined up with their backs to the mass grave, the POWs came to attention, and remained in that position, as the War Mutuu shuffl?ed past and shot each one of them in the head. The bodies fell backwards, dead eyes staring up at an alien sky, as they landed side by side. Vanderveen forced herself to look, to burn the moment into her memory, so that she would never forget. Then it was over, the markerless grave was fi?lled in, and the work day began. A seemingly endless stretch of time in which Vanderveen and her companions stumbled from one task to the next like slow-motion zombies. Finally, after what seemed like a day spent in hell, the POWs were released. All Vanderveen wanted to do was eat, fall facedown on her grubby pallet, and drop into a dreamless sleep.
But even that small pleasure was denied her because just as the diplomat joined the chow line, she was immediately called away. It seemed that the LG was about to hold what the word-walker called, “A special session,”
which left the foreign service offi?cer with no choice but to attend.
As Vanderveen approached barracks nine, she saw that extra guards had been posted all around the structure. They didn’t look like guards, since the marines were seemingly occupied by a variety of routine chores, but all of them were ready to intervene should a Ramanthian guard or an airborne monitor enter the area. Then, while the guards did whatever was necessary to stall, the LG would have time to break off their meeting and hide anything that might be incriminating.
But there were no signs of impending interference as the diplomat traded nods with the tough-looking noncom who sat cleaning his boots on the front steps and entered the building. Blankets had been hung over the windows, and the sun had started to set, so there wasn’t much light inside. What there was emanated from a single glow cone and served to frost the top of the large sphere that rested on the table at the center of the room. The construct was about four feet in diameter and nearly identical to the recon ball that Vanderveen had encountered during the fi?nal hours of the battle on LaNor.
All of which caused the diplomat’s heart to leap since what she took to be a cyborg could be the fi?rst harbinger of help. Had one of the Confederacy’s battle groups dropped into orbit around Jericho? Yes! Vanderveen thought excitedly, and hurried to join the group gathered around the beat-up-looking sphere. Batkin was nearing the end of his narrative. “. . . At that point another prisoner entered, sat down, and began to talk. And it soon became obvious that he was ready to cut a deal with Tragg.”
It wasn’t what Vanderveen had been hoping for, and she was about to ask a question when Hooks beat her to it.
“This is ridiculous,” the offi?cial said contemptuously.
“Why should we believe this nonsense? Assuming this individual is who he claims to be, then he’s massively incompetent! Ten, no eleven people are dead, due to his negligence.”
“Maybe,” Nankool allowed cautiously, “and maybe not. Remember, Madame X works for me, and I know what she expects of her operatives. And she wouldn’t be very happy if one of them were to spend all his time waiting for information to come his way. She would argue that it was Batkin’s duty to enter the camp. Regardless of what might follow. Let’s hear the rest of what he has to say before arriving at any conclusions.”
Hooks didn’t like the answer, but there wasn’t much the secretary could do except fume, as Batkin prepared to resume his narrative. A rather tricky moment, because the spy not only knew who Hooks was, but why the offi?cial wanted to preempt the report. “Why listen to my secondhand account,” Batkin inquired rhetorically, “when you can watch the real thing?”
That was when a holo blossomed over the cyborg and the entire LG was treated to a shot of a man’s back with Tragg beyond. Hooks felt a moment of relief, but that emotion was short-lived as his voice was heard, and the rest of the group turned to stare at him. “I think the sonofabitch is going to run,” Batkin remarked mildly. However, Hooks was already in motion by then—and Vanderveen was the only person between the senior diplomat and the door.
But if Hooks thought he could run the blond over and make a dash for Tragg’s prefab, he was sadly mistaken. Because rather than wait for the two-hundred-pound man to overpower her—the diplomat threw her body into the air and hit the offi?cial with what could only be described as a fl?ying tackle. Vanderveen had the breath knocked out of her as both of them crashed to the fl?oor.
Hooks struggled to extricate himself, and was just about to do so, when Schell and Nankool got ahold of him.
