Torch of Freedom

with us if we absentmindedly misplaced their best hyper-physicists by feeding them to some kind of rogue terminus.'

'That's probably true,' Du Havel agreed with a chuckle. 'And that doesn't even consider the kind of PR effect it could have on the summit between Manticore and Haven.'

The others around the conference table nodded, although in Wix's case it was obviously a nod of acknowledgment, not agreement. Eloise Pritchart's acceptance of Torch as the site for her summit meeting with Elizabeth Winton had reached the Torch System two days ago, and no one in that room was unaware of the monumental possibilities direct, face-to-face negotiations between the two warring heads of state presented. Wix, though, clearly failed to see the connection Du Havel was making, and the prime minister shrugged.

'I never said it would be a logical effect, Dr. Wix,' he said. 'Human beings, however, don't always proceed on the basis of logic. For that matter, I think they almost never proceed on the basis of logic, when you come down to it. If nothing else, the fact that we'd managed to 'misplace,' as Thandi puts it, an entire survey team just three months before the summit would probably put something of a damper on the festivities. I imagine some people might even take it as an omen for the summit's ultimate chances of success, and the last thing anyone needs at this point is any sort of self-fulfilling prophecy of doom and gloom.'

'I could live with that, Web,' Palane said dryly. 'I'd just as soon not piss Queen Elizabeth off at us, though.'

'Worst-case scenario, Your Majesty,' Captain Zachary said, 'is that we can't survey the other end at all. Or that we can't chart it well enough to come back through it, anyway. In that case, we're looking at having to come home the long way around, via a regular hyper-space route.'

'Would that be likely to pose any significant problems or risks?' Du Havel asked.

'Mr. Prime Minister, there's no way anyone could make this process risk free, whatever you do,' Wix pointed out. 'We could have dropped a decimal point in our analysis of the terminus. Over the last couple of hundred years, we've actually turned up a terminus no one has ever successfully transited. Just one. That's an absurdly tiny percentage of the total, but it has happened. Frankly, though, the possibility of something that unlikely happening would be a lot greater than the possibility that Harvest Joy couldn't get home again—eventually—from the other end of the bridge, wherever it is.'

'That's true, Mr. Prime Minister,' Zachary agreed. 'The longest wormhole leg anyone's ever charted is right on nine hundred light-years long in normal-space terms. The average is a lot shorter than that, and transits of more than three or four hundred light-years are rare. Harvest Joy, on the other hand,has a four-month unrefueled endurance. That gives us a cruising radius of eight hundred light-years before we'd have to re-bunker, and that figure is based on our having to make the entire trip under impeller drive. As soon as we could get into a grav wave, our endurance would go up hugely, so we'd have to go a hell of a lot farther directly away from any settled area of the galaxy before we wouldn't be able to get home eventually.'

'Well, that's a relief,' Du Havel said.

'So are we prepared to authorize the transit?' Kare asked.

'I think . . . yes,' the prime minister replied after a thoughtful moment, and glanced at the queen. 'Finding out where that terminus connects to is going to have too many economic and strategic implications for us to even think about delaying over something as . . . esoteric as this 'kick,' I think.'

'I agree.' Queen Berry nodded, but she also frowned. 'Before we do, though, is there any reason you have to go along, Dr. Kare?'

'I beg your pardon, Your Majesty?'

'I asked if there was any reason you, personally, would have to go along,' the queen repeated.

'Well, no . . . not really, I suppose,' Kare said slowly. 'It's my project, though, Your Majesty. If we're going to send anyone through, then I ought to be going along, as well. Sort of like the captain going along with the rest of his ship.'

'With all due respect, Jordin,' Zachary said with a chuckle, 'that's not really the best example you could have come up with. It wouldn't be like a captain going along with the rest of her ship; it would be like an admiral going along with one of the ships under her command. You might want to consider which one of us would actually be in command.'

'Well, you would, of course, Josepha!' Kare said quickly.

'And that's my point,' Berry said. 'From what you're saying, it sounds to me like the return charting ought to be pretty straightforward. They aren't going to need you or Dr. Wix to do it, at any rate, right?'

'Right,' Kare acknowledged with manifest unwillingness. 'But—'

'But I'm afraid that means you're staying home, Doctor.' There was understanding, and more than a little compassion, in the teenaged monarch's voice, yet that voice was also firm. 'I know we're almost certainly worrying about nothing. And I know how much I always hated it when Daddy told me I couldn't do something I really wanted to do. Especially when I knew that he knew I wasn't really going to get into trouble if I did it. And I know you're going to be really pissed off if I don't let you go along with Captain Zachary. Despite which, I'm not going to.'

'Your Majesty—' Kare began, but Berry shook her head.

'Doctor,' she said with a very slight yet undeniably impish smile, 'you're grounded.'

Chapter Twenty-Seven

'Ready to proceed, Ma'am,' Commander Samuel Lim, HMS Harvest Joy's executive officer reported crisply.

'Thank you, Sam,' Captain Josepha Zachary acknowledged, and glanced one last time around her bridge.

Although she'd managed to hang on to Harvest Joy, she had an entirely different complement of officers from the one she'd had for the exploration of the Lynx Terminus. They were just as good a bunch, she thought, but there was a subtle difference this time around. Last time, everyone had been a newbie as far as wormhole exploration was concerned; this time, she was the experienced 'Old Lady' whose calm, confident demeanor everyone else was trying to duplicate.

The thought amused her more than a little, and she turned her attention to one of the half-dozen other veterans of the Lynx Terminus expedition who were back aboard Harvest Joy today. Dr. Michael William Hall was the third-ranking member of Dr. Kare's team, in terms of seniority, which made him the most senior scientist present, given Queen Berry's edict. Hall's shaved scalp gleamed as if it had been waxed, and with his swarthy complexion, broad shoulders, and generally muscular physique he looked far more like the stereotype of a rugby player (which he was) than of an extraordinarily well-qualified hyper-physicist (which he also was). At the moment, she suspected, Hall was finding it a bit difficult to restrain his own half-triumphant and half- sympathetic smile as he reflected upon what must be going through Jordin Kare and Richard Wix's minds about now. It was truly amazing how stubborn Berry Zilwicki could be when she set her mind to it, Zachary reflected.

Or maybe not so amazing at all, given the stories about what she survived in Old Chicago before the Zilwickis came along, she thought much more grimly, then shook that thought aside.

'If you're ready, Doctor?' she asked out loud, arching one eyebrow.

'We're ready, Captain,' Hall confirmed for the remainder of his team. He was the only one actually on the bridge; the others were assembled under Dr. Linda Hronek, the survey expedition's fourth ranking scientist, in the wardroom which had been transformed temporarily into the science team's command post.

Lieutenant Gordon Keller, Harvest Joy's tactical officer, had made himself even more than normally useful helping them set up their equipment. Which was saying quite a bit, since Lieutenant Keller was always useful to have around. He was definitely on the young side for a cruiser's tactical officer, but Harvest Joy's combat days were well behind her now.