Worlds of Honor

reason all those monitoring systems existed: to give time for remedial measures, or for evacuation, or at the very least to spin the generators fully up before they had to take the load.

Only this time there was no warning . . . or not enough, anyway. Almost all of the barrier panels slammed into position, and most of the pressers came up before the avalanche hit them, but they were still spinning up to full power. Those intended to protect the slopes themselves were closer to the threat. They had less time to reach full power, and most of them failed completely under the sudden, enormous load, while many of those meant to protect the resort facilities themselves were only partially successful at their designed function.

The lift towers for the advanced and intermediate slopes survived undamaged, as did three-quarters of the resort's other buildings and promenades. But almost seven hundred morning skiers found themselves squarely in the path of thundering death with no more than a few minutes warning. Some were lucky; they were on the fringes of the avalanche and managed to get clear of its outriders. Others had brought individual counter-grav belts with them as a means to avoid the lines at the lifts, and most of those managed to activate their belts and lift out of the way in time. Still others turned and skied as they never had before, racing madly to outrun destruction, and some of those managed to get clear, too. But over four hundred people were unable to escape, and the churning wall of snow and boulders smashed over them mercilessly.

Those in position to see it watched in horror as one tiny cluster of figures after another was overtaken, overwhelmed, and pounded under, and still the avalanche thundered onward. It hit the first of the inner perimeter of baffles, and spouts of snow spumed upward. Impossible concentrations of moving mass rammed the beam generators back on their reinforced foundations like pile drivers, but somehow they held, and the horrified spectators felt a tiny surge of hope. If one baffle had held, perhaps all of them would.

But all of them didn't, and the avalanche seemed to have a malevolent life of its own, a sort of bestial sentience which sought out the chinks in the resort's armor like a hexapuma stalking a wounded Sphinx tri-horn. And when it found those chinks, it sent torrents of destruction lunging brutally through them, smashing and crushing everything in their path.

Just like the torrent that crashed over the beginners' slopes, and the lift tower serving them, in a wave of snow-white death.

'My God.'

Honor didn't realize for almost a second that the whisper had been her own. The scanner tech riding in the pinnace's tac section had gotten the on-board sensors reconfigured from navigational to tactical analysis mode without orders, and Honor stared in numb horror at the holo projections before her. The lethal tide of destruction had slammed deep into the perimeter of the resort below her. At least a half dozen structures had been completely buried, and her stomach tightened as she wondered how many people had been on the slopes when that monster hit. Honor Harrington was from Sphinx, and Sphinx was the coldest of the Star Kingdom's three habitable planets. She knew all about what an avalanche could do, and she keyed her com.

'Bravo Leader, this is Bravo Three,' she said, and at least she sounded as if she were coming back on balance, for her voice was calm and crisp once more. 'I am assuming control of the flight.'

'Three, this is Leader,' the relief in Lieutenant Freemantle's voice was unmistakable. 'The flight is yours, Ma'am. What do we do?'

'First, we come round to starboard,' Honor told him. 'We'll make a sweep down the path of the slide, from top to bottom. I want a full tac scan. Heat sources as small as people are going to be hard to spot through snow, but—'

'Bravo Flight, this is ExCom,' another voice cut in angrily. 'Return to profile immediately!'

Honor grimaced and made herself strangle a burst of fury as Novaya Tyumen's words rattled in her ear bug. She recognized personal anger when she felt it, and this was no time for it.

'ExCom, Three,' she said instead, forcing herself to speak normally. 'There are injured civilians down there. The people digging them out are going to need the best data they can get, and—'

'I didn't ask for your advice, Bravo Three!' Novaya Tyumen snapped. 'It's more important that we reorganize properly before we just go chargin' in, so that we can use our resources most effectively. Now return to profile and prepare to reverse course!'

'Negative, ExCom,' Honor said flatly. 'I am assuming control of all Bravo assets. Bravo Flight, form on me. Bravo Three, out.'

'Goddamn you, Harrington!' Novaya Tyumen shouted, his usual supercilious hauteur brushed aside by the hatred festering between the two of them. 'I've had just about enough of you! Now you get your ass back into formation and the fuck back up here before I come down there and ki—'

'ExCom, this is Captain Tammerlane,' a deep, coldly furious voice said suddenly, and Novaya Tyumen's tirade chopped off in mid-syllable. Tammerlane was using the squadron ops net rather than using Broadsword's internal communications to speak to Novaya Tyumen. That meant every pinnace in the exercise could hear every word he was saying, and Honor felt her lips purse in a silent whistle at the public slap in the face her skipper had just given the baron. 'I am formally notifying you that the exercise has been scrubbed. Commander Harrington has my authorization to reassume command of this ship's pinnaces immediately, since it would appear that she—unlike some people—actually has a clue about what to do with them now, not three hours from now. Do you have a problem with that, ExCom?'

'Uh, no, Sir,' Novaya Tyumen said quickly. 'Of course not. I only wanted to avoid the sort of command confusion and, ah, impetuosity which might prevent us from makin' optimum use of our resources.'

Honor glanced over at Chief Zariello. She shouldn't have, of course. It was prejudicial to authority, if nothing else. But she couldn't help herself, and she saw the same contempt flicker in the chief's eyes. Not that either of them had ever had any intention of obeying Novaya Tyumen. Bravo Three was already buffeting heavily as she sliced down into atmosphere, headed for the avalanche site at high mach numbers, and every one of Broadsword's other pinnaces followed right behind her while they listened to their coms and waited for their captain's response.

'No doubt that's a worthy ambition, ExCom,' Tammerlane said, still coldly, 'but the people who just got buried need help now— even if it's not the best organized rescue effort we could possibly arrange—one hell of a lot more than they need a well-organized effort after they've already died of suffocation or hypothermia. Don't you agree?'

'Yes, Sir. Of course!'

'Good. I'm delighted to hear that, ExCom. And since we're in agreement, why don't you just turn the rest of your pinnaces over to Commander Harrington until you can get `reorganized' dirtside yourself?'

'Of course, Sir.' Novaya Tyumen sounded as if he were chewing ten-centimeter iron spikes, but there really wasn't much else he could say. 'Bravo Three,' the commander went on after a moment, and Honor didn't need any empathy to recognize the barely contained hate smoking in that grating tone, 'you are in command until ExCom can move dirtside. All other pilots, Bravo Three is in command until you hear differently from me.'

'Understood, ExCom.' Honor tried very hard to keep any trace of triumph out of her own voice, but she knew she'd failed, and somehow, as she listened to the acknowledgments of the other section leaders, she couldn't seem to make herself care as much as she should have.

'All pinnaces will form on Bravo Three,' she continued on more crisply. 'Charlie Section, I want you out on my starboard wing. Hotel, you take port. We'll start with a line abreast flight down the main path of the slide with a full tac sweep. Drive those thermal sensors hard, people. All the junk that avalanche brought down with it is going to play hob with our sonar and DIR, so the thermals are probably going to be the best we have today. Then—'

She went on, giving her orders in a clear, strong voice, yet as she looked out at the vast swath of destruction below her, she knew deep inside how very likely it was that all their efforts would be useless for anyone who had been caught in its path.

'Ranjit? Ranjit?'

Ranjit Hibson groaned as a small hand shook his shoulder. His eyes slid open and he blinked, trying to orient himself.

His head was in his sister's lap. She was hunched over him, her shadowed face peering anxiously down at him, and he managed to pat her knee with his right hand before he rolled his head to look about him. The lift car