Worlds of Honor

operations.

'No doubt, Sir, but you have people getting in one another's way `out there,' ' Honor said coldly, pointing in turn at two squads of Marines who were crowded tightly enough together to hamper one another's efforts as they tried to dig out around the shell of one of the buildings which had not survived. The rescuers were restricted to shovels and only light tractors and pressers, because even with the tactical sensors from the pinnaces and the Marines' skinsuits, they could only see a couple of meters into the snow with any clarity. That meant they couldn't afford to use more efficient means of excavation for fear of killing the very people they were trying to rescue. 'Under the circumstances, you should be able to detail more people to search operations so that civilians now en route will at least know where to dig when they get here!'

'And just how do you propose to search that area?' Novaya Tyumen demanded contemptuously, and shook a sheaf of hardcopy in her face. 'These are your own tac readouts, Commander. There's so much junk and garbage—rocks and tree trunks and pieces of buildin's and God only knows what—buried out there even deep- imagin' radar can't see shit! So you tell me just how in hell we're supposed t' find anythin' out there even if we tried!'

'We can start by trying to identify some of the garbage as such so that we can then ignore it and concentrate on the rest of the targets, Sir.' Honor's voice was still controlled, but it was also ice cold, and its very control made it a slap in the face after Novaya Tyumen's choleric outburst. 'Certainly there's a lot of wreckage out there to confuse the DIR, but if we can at least locate the biggest pieces, we can use snow probes to find them and get microphones down there to listen for any sounds from trapped people. Human beings spent centuries finding avalanche victims before anyone ever thought of deep-imaging radar or sonar, Sir, and if we don't start looking soon—'

'I refuse to discuss this any further, Commander,' Novaya Tyumen told her with chill, sneering precision. 'I've made my decision, and I'm not squanderin' resources on some stupid, glory-grabbin' officer's quixotic lunacy when there are lives to save right here! Now stand aside and let me get on my with job before I file formal charges for insubordination.'

' `Insubordination'?' Honor repeated. She didn't recognize her own voice. It was much too calm and reasonable to belong to her at that moment. She heard Nimitz's deep, sibilant hiss of disdain as the 'cat glared at Novaya Tyumen, and then she smiled a cold, dangerous smile. 'You file whatever you want to file, Sir,' she told him, and turned and walked away.

Novaya Tyumen glared after her, and his face went apoplectic purple as she pulled an ear bug and attached boom mike from her parka pocket, clipped it into place, and spoke briefly into the mike. She listened for a few seconds, her head cocked to one side, then said something else into the mike, turned on her heel, and strode directly to Major Stimson.

Novaya Tyumen's eyes blazed with fury as she headed for the Marine, for there could be no mistaking her purpose, whatever he might have ordered. He couldn't believe the sheer gall of her, and rage boiled within him as Stimson looked up at her approach. Ensign Haverty was saying something to the baron, but he waved the young woman aside and went stamping through the snow after Honor.

'—start right there,' she was saying to the Marine when Novaya Tyumen reached them. She pointed at a corner of the crumpled lift tower. 'From the tac system overlays, it looks like the main thrust of the avalanche must have been roughly in this direction,' she turned, sweeping her arm to illustrate her sentence, 'and that checks with where Major Berczi tells me the one recovered car was found, so we'll want to head northeast. We'll go with a half-klick DIR sweep by two of the pinnaces first, then follow up with your people's skinsuit sensors and snow probes on anything they turn up. If we get a solid hit, we'll—'

'What the hell d'you think you're doin'?' Novaya Tyumen bellowed. 'Goddamn it, I ordered you—'

'Now just one minute, you—' Major Stimson's head had snapped up as Novaya Tyumen approached, and his eyes flashed as he began a furious reply, but Honor's raised hand stopped him. She watched the Marine's face for a moment, as if to be certain he had himself under control, and then turned to Novaya Tyumen with what a casual observer might have called an attentive expression. Only the small muscle twitch at the corner of her mouth gave any overt lie to that impression, but the baron flinched involuntarily under the disgust in her dark eyes.

'I believe I was speaking to Major Stimson, not to you, Sir,' she told him coldly.

'And just what were you talkin' to him about?' Novaya Tyumen sneered.

'Doing our job,' Honor said flatly.

'Well whatever orders you were givin' him are countermanded right now, Commander!' Novaya Tyumen told her in a low, vicious tone. 'And you can just report your ass back aboard ship under arrest!'

'I'm afraid I can't do that, Sir,' Honor told him. Something about her expression rang an alarm bell in his mind at last, but he was too enraged to heed it.

' `Can't do that'?' he mimicked savagely. 'Well that's too fuckin' bad! Major Stimson!' he wheeled to the Marine. 'You will place this officer under close arrest and escort her immediately back to her ship!'

'I'm afraid the Major can't do that, either, Sir.' Honor told him, and her smile looked like a Sphinx neo-shark rising out of deep water as she looked over Novaya Tyumen's shoulder at someone behind him. 'I believe Ensign Haverty is trying to get your attention,' she observed.

Novaya Tyumen glared at her, confused, despite his fury, by the apparent non sequitur. Almost despite himself, he turned and looked in the direction of her gaze, and his confusion grew greater as he saw the ensign struggling through the snow towards them.

'What the fuck d'you want?' he barked as Haverty reached him.

'I was trying to tell you, Sir,' the ensign replied. 'You've got a com message back at the CP.' Haverty's eyes strayed towards Honor, despite her best effort to keep them locked on Novaya Tyumen's face. 'It's from Captain Tammerlane, Sir. You are to report back aboard immediately.'

'What?' Novaya Tyumen goggled at her. 'But—but what about the operation down here?' he demanded.

'All I know is what the Captain told me, Sir,' Haverty said. 'When I told him you were away from the CP, he told me to find you, tell you to report back aboard Broadsword immediately, and inform you that Commander Harrington is now in command of all SAR operations.'

'But I'm in command of—'

'You are in command of the Skyhawk evaluation exercise,' Honor told him flatly, 'and that is all you are in command of. This is no longer an evaluation exercise, and you are no longer in command of it. So get out of the way, Commander. Now.'

He stared at her, his eyes sick as he realized who she had been speaking to on her earbug mike. It hadn't been Stimson after all. She'd been tied into the com aboard her pinnace, sneaking around and talking to Tammerlane behind his back, and—

'Excuse me, Sir?' He turned as if in a daze and found himself face-to-face with Chief Zariello. 'Lieutenant Hedges just informed me that I'm to transport you back to Broadsword, Commander,' the CPO told him. Novaya Tyumen blinked at him, and Zariello nodded respectfully to the waiting pinnace. 'If you'll come this way, Sir, we'll have you aboard in no time,' he said, and there was no expression in his voice at all.

Eternity crawled as Susan Hibson clawed her way upward through a shifting, icy world. Her ski suit kept her body warm, but her soul was another matter, and the darkness and closeness and fear drove a dreadful chill deep into the heart of her. She had no light, no guide but her sense of up and down, and she wanted more than she had ever wanted anything before to curl up into a ball and just huddle where she was until someone found her. But she couldn't do that. Ranjit was hurt—worse than he wanted her to believe, she knew—and Andrea Manders was trapped, and so was whoever had gripped Andrea's ankle, and that meant she couldn't stop.

She closed her eyes, feeling the ice against her cheeks as she reached forward once more in the dark, driving her gloveless fingers into the snow ahead of her and dragging herself through it like some sightless worm. She'd lost her broken ski pole, and her hands were like frozen iron claws at the ends of her arms, she could barely feel them now, but she knew they'd been abraded bloody long since. Not that there was anything she could do about it, and she tried not to think about it, just as she tried not to think about how much air she had, or whether the snow would let more air pass through. She didn't think it would, but she didn't know, and it wasn't something