Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle - The mote in God ' s eye

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Prologue

"Throughout the past thousand years of history it has been traditional to regard the

Alderson Drive as an unmixed blessing. Without the faster than light travel Alderson's discoveries

made possible, humanity would have been trapped in the tiny prison of the Solar System when the

Great Patriotic Wars destroyed the CoDominium on Earth. Instead, we had already settled more than

two hundred worlds.

"A blessing, yes. We might now be extinct were it not for the Alderson Drive. But unmixed?

Consider. The same tramline effect that colonized the stars, the same interstellar contacts that

allowed the formation of the First Empire, allow interstellar war. The worlds wrecked in two

hundred years of Secession Wars were both settled and destroyed by ships using the Alderson Drive.

"Because of the Alderson Drive we need never consider the space between the stars. Because

we can shunt between stellar systems in zero time, our ships and ships' drives need cover only

interplanetary distances. We say that the Second Empire of Man rules two hundred worlds and all

the space between, over fifteen million cubic parsecs.

"Consider the true picture. Think of myriads of tiny bubbles, very sparsely scattered,

rising through a vast black sea. We rule some of the bubbles. Of the waters we know nothing. .

-from a speech delivered by Dr. Anthony Horvath at the Blaine Institute, A.D. 3029.

A.D. 3017

THE CRAZY EDDIE PROBE

1 Command

"Admiral's compliments, and you're to come to his office right away," Midshipman Staley

announced.

Commander Roderick Blaine looked frantically around the bridge, where his officers were

directing repairs with low and urgent voices, surgeons assisting at a difficult operation. The

gray steel compartment was a confusion of activities, each orderly by itself, but the overall

impression was of chaos. Screens above one helmsman's station showed the planet below and the

other ships in orbit near MacArthur, but everywhere else the panel covers had been removed from

consoles, test instruments were clipped into their insides, and technicians stood by with color-

coded electronic assemblies to replace everything that seemed doubtful. Thumps and whines sounded

through the ship as somewhere aft the engineering crew worked on the hull.

The scars of battle showed everywhere, ugly burns where the ship's protective Langston

Field had overloaded momentarily. An irregular hole larger than a man's fist was burned completely

through one console, and now two technicians seemed permanently installed in the system by a web

of cables. Rod Blaine looked at the black stains that had spread across his battle dress. A whiff

of metal vapor and burned meat was still in his nostrils, or in his brain, and again he saw fire

and molten metal erupt from the hull and wash across his left side. His left arm was still bound

across his chest by an elastic bandage, and he could follow most of the previous week's activities

by the stains it carried.

And I've only been aboard an hour! he thought. With the Captain ashore, and everything a

mess, I can't leave now! He turned to the midshipman. "Right away?"

"Yes, sir. The signal's marked urgent."

Nothing for it, then, and Rod would catch hell when the Captain came back aboard. First

Lieutenant Cargill and Engineer Sinclair were competent men, but Rod was Exec and damage control

was his responsibility, even if he'd been away from MacArthur when she took most of the hits.

Rod's Marine orderly coughed discreetly and pointed to the stained uniform. "Sir, we've

time to get you more decent?"

"Good thinking." Rod glanced at the status board to be sure. Yes, he had half an hour

before he could take a boat down to the planet's surface. Leaving sooner wouldn't get him to the

Admiral's office any quicker. It would be a relief to get out of these coveralls. He hadn't

undressed since he was wounded.

They had to send for a surgeon's mate to undress him. The medic snipped at the armor cloth

embedded in his left arm and muttered. "Hold still, sir. That arm's cooked good." His voice was

disapproving. "You should have been in sick bay a week ago."

"Hardly possible," Rod answered. A week before, MacArthur had been in battle with a rebel

warship, who'd scored more hits than she ought to have before surrendering. After the victory Rod

was prize master in the enemy vessel, and there weren't facilities for proper treatment there. As

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the armor came away he smelled something worse than week-old sweat. Touch of gangrene, maybe.

"Yessir." A few more threads were cut away. The synthetic was as tough as steel. "Now it's

gonna take surgery, Commander. Got to cut all that away before the regeneration stimulators can

work. While we got you in sick bay we can fix that nose."

"I like my nose," Rod told him coldly. He fingered the slightly crooked appendage and

recalled the battle when it was broken. Rod thought it made him look older, no bad thing at twenty-

four standard years; and it was the badge of an earned, not inherited, success. Rod was proud of

his family background, but there were times when the Blaine reputation was a bit hard to live up

to.

Eventually the armor was cut loose and his arm smeared with Numbitol. The stewards helped

him into a powder blue uniform, red sash, gold braid, epaulettes; all wrinkled and crushed, but

better than monofiber coveralls. The stiff jacket hurt his arm despite the anesthetic until he

found that he could rest his forearm on the pistol butt.

When he was dressed he boarded the landing gig from MacArthur's hangar deck, and the

coxswain let the boat drop through the big flight elevator doors without having the spin taken off

the ship. It was a dangerous maneuver, but it saved time. Retros fired, and the little winged

flyer plunged into atmosphere.

NEW CHICAGO: Inhabited world, Trans-Coalsack Sector, approximately 20 parsecs from Sector

Capital. The primary is an F9 yellow star commonly referred to as Beta Hortensis.

The atmosphere is very nearly Earth-normal and breathable without aids or filters. Gravity

is 1.08 standard. The planetary radius is 1.05, and mass is 1.21 Earth-standard, indicating a

planet of greater than normal density. New Chicago is inclined at 41 degrees with a semi-major

axis of 1.06 AU, moderately eccentric. The resulting variations in seasonal temperatures have

confined the inhabited areas to a relatively narrow band in the south temperate zone.

There is one moon at normal distance, commonly called Evanston. The origin of the name is

obscure.

New Chicago is 70 percent seas. Land area is mostly mountainous with continuing volcanic

activity. The extensive metal industries of the First Empire period were nearly all destroyed in

the Succession Wars; reconstruction of an industrial base has proceeded satisfactorily since New

Chicago was admitted to the Second Empire in AD. 2940. Most inhabitants reside in a single city

which bears the same name as the planet. Other population centers are widely scattered, with none

having a population over 45,000. Total planet population was reported as 6.7 million in the census

of 2990. There are iron mining and smelting towns in the mountains, and extensive agricultural

settlements. The planet is self-sufficient in foodstuffs.

New Chicago possesses a growing merchant fleet, and is located at a convenient point to

serve as a center of TransCoalsack interstellar trade. It is governed by a governor general and a

council appointed by the Viceroy of TransCoalsack Sector, there is an elected assembly, and two

delegates have been admitted to the Imperial Parliament.

Rod Blaine scowled at the words flowing across the screen of his pocket computer. The

physical data were current, but everything else was obsolete. The rebels had changed even the name

of their world, from New Chicago to Dame Liberty. Her government would have to be built all over

again. Certainly she'd lose her delegates; she might even lose the right to an elected assembly.

He put the instrument away and looked down. They were over mountainous country, and he saw

no signs of war. There hadn't been any area bombardments, thank God.

It happened sometimes: a city fortress would hold out with the aid of satellite-based

planetary defenses. The Navy had no time for prolonged sieges. Imperial policy was to finish

rebellions at the lowest possible cost in lives-but to finish them. A holdout rebel planet might

be reduced to glittering lava fields, with nothing surviving but a few cities lidded by the black

domes of Langston Fields; and what then? There weren't enough ships to transport food across

interstellar distances. Plague and famine would follow.

Yet, he thought, it was the only possible way. He had sworn the Oath on taking the Imperial

commission. Humanity must be reunited into one government, by persuasion or by force, so that the

hundreds of years of Secession Wars could never happen again. Every Imperial officer had seen what

horrors those wars brought; that was why the academies were located on Earth instead of at the

Capital.

As they neared the city he saw the first signs of battle. A ring of blasted lands, mined

outlying fortresses, broken concrete rails of the transportation system; then the almost untouched

city which had been secure within the perfect circle of its Langston Field. The city had taken

minor damage, but once the Field was off, effective resistance had ceased. Only fanatics fought on

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against the Imperial Marines.

They passed over the ruins of a tall building crumpled over by a falling landing boat.

Someone must have fired on the Marines and the pilot hadn't wanted his death to be for nothing...

They circled the city, slowing to allow them to approach the landing docks without

breaking out all the windows. The buildings were old, most built by hydrocarbon technology, Rod

guessed, with strips torn out and replaced by more modem structures. Nothing remained of the First

Empire city which had stood here.

When they dropped onto the port on top of Government House, Rod saw that slowing hadn't

been required. Most city windows were smashed already. Mobs milled in the streets, and the only

moving vehicles were military convoys. Some people stood idly, others ran in and out of shops.

Gray-coated Imperial Marines stood guard behind electrified riot fences around Government House.

The flyer landed.

Blaine was rushed down the elevator to the Governor General's floor. There wasn't a woman

in the building, although Imperial government offices usually bristled with them, and Rod missed

the girls. He'd been in space a long time. He gave his name to the ramrod-straight Marine at the

receptionist's desk and waited.

He wasn't looking forward to the coming interview, and spent the time glaring at blank

walls. All the decorative paintings, the three-d star map with Imperial banners floating above the

provinces, all the standard equipment of a governor general's office on a Class One planet, were

gone, leaving ugly places on the walls.

The guard motioned him into the office. Admiral Sir Vladimir Richard George Plekhanov,

Vice Admiral of the Black, Knight of St. Michael and St. George, was seated at the Governor

General's desk. There was no sign of His Excellency Mr. Haruna, and for a moment Rod thought the

Admiral was alone. Then he noticed Captain Cziller, his immediate superior as master of MacArthur,

standing by the window. All the transparencies had been knocked out, and there were deep scratches

in the paneled walls. The displays and furniture were gone. Even the Great Seal crown and

spaceship, eagle, sickle and hammer-was missing from above the duralplast desk. There had never in

Rod's memory been a duralplast desk in a governor general's office.

"Commander Blaine reporting as ordered, sir."

Plekhanov absently returned the salute. Cziller didn't look around from the window. Rod

stood at stiff attention while the Admiral regarded him with an unchanging expression. Finally:

"Good morning, Commander."

"Good morning, sir."

"Not really. I suppose I haven't seen you since I last visited Crucis Court. How is the

Marquis?"

"Well when I was last home, sir."

The Admiral nodded and continued to regard Blaine with a critical look. He hasn't changed,

Rod thought. An enormously competent man, who fought a tendency to fat by exercising in high

gravity. The Navy sent Plekhanov when hard fighting was expected. He's never been known to excuse

an incompetent officer, and there was a gunroom rumor that he'd had the Crown Prince-now Emperor-

stretched over a mess table and whacked with a spatball paddle back when His Highness was serving

as a midshipman in Plataea.

"I have your report here, Blaine. You had to fight your way to the rebel Field generator.

You lost a company of Imperial Marines."

"Yes, sir." Fanatic rebel guardsmen had defended the generator station, and the battle had

been fierce.

"And just what the devil were you doing in a ground action?" the Admiral demanded.

"Cziller gave you that captured cruiser to escort our assault carrier. Did you have orders to go

down with the boats?"

"No, sir."

"I suppose you think the aristocracy isn't subject to Navy discipline?"

"Of course I don't think that, sir."

Plekhanov ignored him. "Then there's this deal you made with a rebel leader. What was his

name?" Plekhanov glanced at the papers. "Stone. Jonas Stone. Immunity from arrest. Restoration of

property. Damn you, do you imagine that every naval officer has authority to make deals with

subjects in rebellion? Or do you hold some diplomatic commission I'm not aware of, Commander?"

"No, sir." Rod's lips were pressed tightly against his teeth. He wanted to shout, but he

didn't. To hell with Navy tradition, he thought. I won the damned war.

"But you do have an explanation?" the Admiral demanded.

"Yes, sir."

"Well?"

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Rod spoke through tightening throat muscles. "Sir. While commanding the prize Defiant, I

received a signal from the rebel city. At that time the city's Langston Field was intact, Captain

Cziller aboard MacArthur was fully engaged with the satellite planetary defenses, and the main

body of the fleet was in general engagement with rebel forces. The message was signed by a rebel

leader. Mr. Stone promised to admit Imperial forces into the city on condition that he obtain full

immunity from prosecution and restoration of his personal property. He gave a time limit of one

hour, and insisted on a member of the aristocracy as guarantor. If there were anything to his

offer, the war would end once the Marines entered the city's Field generator house. There being no

possibility of consultation with higher authority, I took the landing force down myself and gave

Mr. Stone my personal word of honor."

Plekhanov frowned. "Your word. As Lord Blaine. Not as a Navy officer."

"It was the only way he'd discuss it, Admiral."

"I see." Plekhanov was thoughtful now. If he disavowed Blaine's word, Rod would be

through, in the Navy, in government, everywhere. On the other hand, Admiral Piekhanov would have

to explain to the House of Peers. "What made you think this offer was genuine?"

"Sir, it was in Imperial code and countersigned by a Navy intelligence officer."

"So you risked your ship-"

"Against the chance of ending the war without destroying the planet. Yes, sir. I might

point out that Mr. Stone's message described the city prison camp where they were keeping the

Imperial officers and citizens."

"I see." Plekhanov's hands moved in a sudden angry gesture. "All right. I've no use for

traitors, even one who helps us. But I'll honor your bargain, and that means I have to give

official approval to your going down with the landing boats. I don't have to like it, Blaine, and

I don't. It was a damn fool stunt."

One that worked, Rod thought. He continued to stand at attention, but he felt the knot in

his guts loosen.

The Admiral grunted. "Your father takes stupid chances. Almost got us both killed on

Tanith. It's a bloody wonder your family's survived through eleven marquises, and it'll be a

bigger one if you live to be twelfth. All right, sit down."

"Thank you, sir." Rod said stiffly, his voice coldly polite.'

The Admiral's face relaxed slightly. "Did I ever tell you your father was my commanding

officer on Tanith?" Plekhanov asked conversationally.

"No, sir. He did." There was still no warmth in Rod's voice.

"He was also the best friend I ever had in the Navy, Commander. His influence put me in

this seat, and he asked to have you under my command."

"Yes, sir." I knew that. Now I wonder why.

"You'd like to ask me what I expected you to do, wouldn't you, Commander?"

Rod twitched in surprise. "Yes, sir."

"What would have happened if that offer hadn't been genuine? If it had been a trap?"

"The rebels might have destroyed my command."

"Yes." Plekhanov's voice was steely calm. "But you thought it worth the risk because you

had a chance to end the war with few casualties on either side. Right?"

"Yes, sir."

"And if the Marines were killed, just what would my fleet have been able to do?" The

Admiral slammed both fists against the desk. "I'd have had no choices at all!" he roared. "Every

week I keep this fleet here is another chance for outies to hit one of our planets! There'd have

been no time to send for another assault carrier and more Marines. If you'd lost your command, I'd

have blasted this planet into the stone age, Blaine. Aristocrat or no, don't you ever put anyone

in that position again! Do you understand me?"

"Yes, sir". He's right. But- What good would the Marines have been with the city's Field

intact? Rod's shoulders slumped. Something. He'd have done something. But what?

"It turned out well," Plekhanov said coldly. "Maybe you were right. Maybe you weren't. You

do another stunt like that and I'll have your sword. Is that understood?" He lifted a printout of

Rod's service career. "Is MacArthur ready for space?"

"Sir?" The question was asked in the same tone as the threat, and it took Rod a moment to

shift mental gears. "For space, sir. Not a battle. And I wouldn't want to see her go far without a

refit." In the frantic hour he'd spent aboard, Rod had carried out a thorough inspection, which

was one reason he needed a shave. Now he sat uncomfortably and wondered. MacArthur's captain stood

at the window, obviously listening, but he hadn't said a word. Why didn't the Admiral ask him?

As Blaine wondered, Plekhanov made up his mind. "Well? Bruno, you're Fleet Captain. Make

your recommendation."

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Bruno Cziller turned from the window. Rod was startled: Cziller no longer wore the little

silver replica of MacArthur that showed him to be her master. Instead the comet and sunburst of

the Naval Staff shone on his breast, and Cziller wore the broad stripes of a brevet admiral.

"How are you, Commander?" Cziller asked formally. Then grinned. That twisted lopsided grin

was famous through MacArthur. "You're looking all right. At least from the right profile you do.

Well, you were aboard an hour. What damage did you find?"

Confused, Rod reported the present condition of MacArthur as he'd found her, and the

repairs he'd ordered. Cziller nodded and asked questions. Finally: "And you conclude she's ready

for space, but not war. Is that it?"

"Yes, sir. Not against a capital ship, anyway."

"It's true, too. Admiral, my recommendation. Commander Blaine is ready for promotion and

we can give him MacArthur to take for refit to New Scotland, then on to the Capital. He can take

Senator Fowler's niece with him."

Give him MacArthur? Rod heard him dimly, wonderingly. He was afraid to believe it, but

here was the chance to show Plekhanov and everyone else.

"He's young. Never be allowed to keep that ship as a first command," Plekhanov said.

"Still and all, it's probably the best way. He can't get in too much trouble going to Sparta by

way of New Caledonia. She's yours, Captain." When Rod said nothing, Plekhanov barked at him. "You.

Blaine. You're promoted to captain and command of MacArthur. My writer will have your orders in

half an hour."

Cziller grinned one-sided. "Say something," he suggested.

"Thank you, sir. I- I thought you didn't approve of me."

"Not sure I do," Plekhanov said. "If I had any choice you'd be somebody's exec. You'll

probably make a good marquis, but you don't have the Navy temperament. I don't suppose it matters,

the Navy's not your career anyway."

"Not any more, sir," Rod said carefully.

It still hurt inside. Big George, who filled a room with barbells when he was twelve and

was built like a wedge before he was sixteen-his brother George was dead in a battle halfway

across the Empire. Rod would be planning his future, or thinking wistfully about home, and the

memory would come as if someone had pricked his soul with a needle. Dead. George?

George should have inherited the estates and titles. Rod had wanted nothing more than a

Navy career and the chance to become Grand Admiral someday. Now less than ten years and he'd have

to take his place in Parliament.

"You'll have two passengers," Cziller said. "One you've met. You do know Lady Sandra

Bright Fowler, don't you? Senator Fowler's niece."

"Yes, sir. I hadn't seen her for years, but her uncle dines at Crucis Court quite often

... then I found her in the prison camp. How is she?"

"Not very good," Cziller said. His grin vanished. "We're packing her home, and I don't

have to tell you to handle with care. She'll be with you as far as New Scotland, and all the way

to the Capital if she wants. That's up to her. Your other passenger, though, that's a different

matter."

Rod looked up attentively. Cziller looked to Plekhanov, got a nod, and continued, "His

Excellency, Trader Horace Hussein Bury, Magnate, Chairman of the Board of Imperial Autonetics, and

something big in the Imperial Traders Association. He stays with you all the way to Sparta, and I

mean he stays aboard your ship, do you understand?"

"Well, not exactly, 'sir," Rod answered.

Plekhanov sniffed. "Cziller made it clear enough. We think Bury was behind this rebellion,

but there's not enough evidence to put him in preventive detention. He'd appeal to the Emperor.

All right, we'll send him to Sparta to make his appeal. As the Navy's guest. But who do I send him

with, Blaine? He's worth millions. More. How many men would turn down a whole planet for a bribe?

Bury could offer one."

"I-yes, sir," Rod said.

"And don't look so damned shocked," Plekhanov barked. "I haven't accused any of my

officers of corruption. But the fact is, you're richer than Bury. He can't even tempt you. It's my

main reason for giving you command of MacArthur, so I don't have to worry about our wealthy

friend."

"I see. Thank you anyway, sir." And I will show you it was no mistake.

Plekhanov nodded as if reading Blaine's thoughts. "You might make a good Navy officer.

Here's your chance. I need Cziller to help govern this planet. The rebels killed the Governor

General."

"Killed Mr. Haruna?" Rod was stunned. He remembered the wrinkled old gentleman; well over

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a hundred when he came to Rod's home- "He's an old friend of my father's."

"He wasn't the only one they killed. They had the heads strung up on pikes outside

Government House. Somebody thought that'd make the people fight on longer. Make 'em afraid to

surrender to us. Well, they have reason to be afraid now. Your deal with Stone. Any other

conditions?"

"Yes, sir. It's off if he refuses to cooperate with Intelligence. He has to name all the

conspirators."

Plekhanov looked significantly at Cziller. "Get your men on that, Bruno. It's a start. All

right, Blaine, get your ship fixed up and scoot." The Admiral stood; the interview was over.

"You'll have a lot to do, Captain. Get to it."

2 The Passengers

Horace Hussein Chamoun al Shamlan Bury pointed out the last of the articles he would take

with him and dismissed the servants. He knew they would wait just outside his suite, ready to

divide the wealth he was leaving behind, but it amused him to make them wait. They would be all

the happier for the thrill of stealing.

When the room was empty he poured a large glass of wine. It was poor quality stuff brought

in after the blockade, but he hardly noticed. Wine was officially forbidden on Levant, which meant

that the hordes of wine sellers foisted off anything alcoholic on their customers, even wealthy

ones like the Bury family. Horace Bury had never developed any real appreciation for expensive

liquors. He bought them to show his wealth, and for entertaining; but for himself anything would

do. Coffees were a different matter.

He was a small man, as were most of the people of Levant, with dark features and a

prominent nose, dark, burning eyes and sharp features, quick gestures, and a violent temper that

only his intimate associates suspected. Alone now, he permitted himself a scowl. There was a

printout from Admiral Plekhanov's writers on the desk, and he easily translated the formally

polite phrases inviting him to leave New Chicago and regretting that no civilian passage would be

available. The Navy was suspicious, and he felt a cold knot of rage threaten to engulf him despite

the wine. He was outwardly calm, though, as he sat at the desk and ticked off points on his

fingers.

What had the Navy on him? There were the suspicions of Naval Intelligence, but no

evidence. There was the usual hatred of the Navy for Imperial Traders, compounded, he thought,

because some of the Navy staff were Jews, and all Jews hated Levantines. But the Navy could have

no real evidence or he wouldn't be going aboard MacArthur as a guest. He'd be in irons. That meant

Jonas Stone still kept his silence.

He ought to keep silence. Bury had paid him a hundred thousand crowns with a promise of

more. But he had no confidence in Stone: two nights before, Bury had seen certain men on lower

Kosciusko Street and paid them fifty thousand crowns, and it shouldn't be long until Stone was

silent forever. Let him whisper secrets in his grave.

Was there anything else undone? he wondered. No. What would come would come, glory be to

Allah . . . He grimaced. That kind of thinking came naturally, and he despised himself for a

superstitious fool. Let his father praise Allah for his accomplishments; fortune came to the man

who left nothing to chance; as he had left few things undone in his ninety standard years.

The Empire had come to Levant ten years after Horace was born, and at first its influence

was small. In those days Imperial policies were different and the planet came into the Empire with

a standing nearly equal to more advanced worlds. Horace Bury's father soon realized Imperialism

could be made to pay. By becoming one of those the Imperials used to govern the planet, he had

amassed immense wealth: he'd sold audiences with the governor, and hawked justice like cabbages in

the market place, but always carefully, always leaving others to face the wrath of the hardnosed

men of the Imperial service.

His father was careful with investments, and he'd used his influence to have Horace

Hussein educated on Sparta. He'd even given him a name suggested by an Imperial Navy officer; only

later did they learn that Horace was hardly common in the Empire and was a name to be laughed at.

Bury drowned the memory of early days in the Capital schools with another beaker of wine.

He'd learned! And now he'd invested his father's money, and his own. Horace Bury wasn't someone to

laugh at. It had taken thirty years, but his agents had located the officer who'd given him that

name. The stereographs of his agony were hidden in Bury's home on Levant. He'd had the last laugh.

Now he bought and sold men who laughed at him, as he bought votes in Parliament, bought

ships, and had almost bought this planet of New Chicago. And by the Prophet-blast!-by damn he'd

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own it yet. Control of New Chicago would give his family influence here beyond the Coal Sack, here

where the Empire was weak and new planets were found monthly. A man might look to-to anything!

The reverie had helped. Now he summoned his agents, the man who'd guard his interests

here, and Nabil, who would accompany him as a servant on the warship. Nabil, a small man, much

smaller than Horace, younger than he looked, with a ferret face that could be disguised many ways,

and skills with dagger and poison learned on ten planets. Horace Hussein Bury smiled. So the

Imperials would keep him prisoner aboard their warships? So long as there were no ships for

Levant, let them. But when they were at a busy port, they might find it harder to do.

For three days Rod worked on MacArthur. Leaking tankage, burned-out components, all had to

be replaced. There were few spares, and MacArthur's crew spent hours in space cannibalizing the

Union war fleet hulks in orbit around New Chicago.

Slowly MacArthur was put back into battle worthy condition. Blaine worked with Jack

Cargill, First Lieutenant and now Exec, and Commander Jock Sinclair, the Chief Engineer. Like many

engineering officers, Sinclair was from New Scotland. His heavy accent was common among Scots

throughout space. Somehow they had preserved it as a badge of pride during the Secession Wars,

even on planets where Gaelic was a forgotten language. Rod privately suspected that the Scots

studied their speech off duty so they'd be unintelligible to the rest of humanity.

Hull plates were welded on, enormous patches of armor stripped from Union warships and

sweated into place. Sinclair worked wonders adapting New Chicago equipment for use in MacArthur,

until he had built a patchwork of components and spares that hardly matched the ship's original

blueprints. The bridge officers worked through the nights trying to explain and describe the

changes to the ship's master computer.

Cargill and Sinclair nearly came to blows over some of the adaptations, Sinclair

maintaining that the important thing was to have the ship ready for space, while the First

Lieutenant insisted that he'd never be able to direct combat repairs because God Himself didn't

know what had been done to the ship.

"I dinna care to hear such blasphemy," Sinclair was saying as Rod came into range. "And is

it nae enough that I ken wha' we hae done to her?"

"Not unless you want to be cook too, you maniac tinkerer! This morning the wardroom cook

couldn't operate the coffeepot! One of your artificers took the microwave heater. Now by God

you'll bring that back. .

"Aye, we'll strip it oot o' number-three tank, just as soon as you find me parts for the

pump it replaces. Can you no be happy, man? The ship can fight again. Or is coffee more

important?"

Cargill took a deep breath, then started over. "The ship can fight," he said in what

amounted to baby talk, "until somebody makes a hole in her. Then she has to be fixed. Now suppose

I had to repair this," he said, laying a hand on something Rod was almost sure was an air adsorber

converter. "The damned thing looks half-melted now. How would I know what was damaged? Or if it

were damaged at all? Suppose. ."

"Man, you wouldna' hae troubles if you did nae fash yoursel' wi . ."

"Will you stop that? You talk like everybody else when you get excited!"

"That's a damn lie?'

But at that point Rod thought it better to step into view. He sent the Chief Engineer to

his end of the ship and Cargill forward. There would be no settling their dispute until MacArthur

could be thoroughly refitted in New Scotland's Yards.

Blaine spent a night in sickbay under orders from the surgeon lieutenant. He came out with

his arm immobile in a tremendous padded cast like a pillow grafted on him. He felt mean and

preternaturally alert for the next few days; but nobody actually laughed out loud in his hearing.

On the third day after taking command Blaine held ship's inspection. All work was stopped

and the ship given spin. Then Blaine and Cargill went over her.

Rod was tempted to take advantage of his recent experience as MacArthur's Exec. He knew

all the places where a lazy executive officer might skimp on the work. But it was his first

inspection, the ship only just under repair from battle damage, and Cargill was too good an

officer to let something pass that he could possibly have corrected. Blaine took a leisurely tour,

checking the important gear but otherwise letting Cargill guide him. As he did, he mentally

resolved not to let to be a precedent. When there was more time, he'd go over the ship and find

out everything.

A full company of Marines guarded the New Chicago spaceport. Since the city's Langston-

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Field generator had fallen there had been no resurgence of hostilities. Indeed, most of the

populace seemed to welcome the Imperial forces with an exhausted relief more convincing than

parades and cheering. But the New Chicago revolt had reached the Empire as a stunning surprise;

resurgence would be no surprise at all.

So Marines patrolled the spaceport and guarded the Imperial boats, and Sally Fowler felt

their eyes as she walked with her servants through hot sunlight toward a boat-shaped lifting body.

They didn't bother her. She was Senator Fowler's niece; she was used to being stared at.

Lovely, one of the guards was thinking. But no expression. You'd think she'd be happy to

be out of that stinking prison camp, but she doesn't look it. Perspiration dripped steadily down

his ribs, and he thought, She doesn't sweat. She was carved from ice by the finest sculptor that

ever lived.

The boat was big, and two-thirds empty. Sally's eyes took in two small dark men-Bury and

his servant, and no doubt about which was which-and four younger men showing fear, anticipation,

and awe. The mark of New Chicago's outback was on them. New recruits, she guessed.

She took one of the last seats at the back. She was not in a conversational mood. Adam and

Annie looked at her with worried expressions, then took seats across the aisle. They knew.

"It's good to be leaving," said Annie.

Sally didn't respond. She felt nothing at all.

She'd been like this ever since the Marines had burst into the prison camp. There had been

good food, and a hot bath, and clean clothes, and the deference of those about her . . . and none

of it had reached her. She'd felt nothing. Those months in the prison camp had burned something

out of her. Perhaps permanently, she thought. It bothered her remotely.

When Sally Fowler left the Imperial University at Sparta with her master's degree in

anthropology she had persuaded her uncle that instead of graduate school she should travel through

the Empire, observe newly conquered provinces, and study primitive cultures first hand. She would

even write a book.

"After all," she had insisted, "what can I learn here? It's out there beyond the Coal Sack

that I'm needed."

She had a mental image of her triumphant return, publications and scholarly articles,

winning a place for herself in her profession rather than passively waiting to be married off to

some young aristocrat. Sally fully intended to marry, but not until she could start with more than

her inheritances. She wanted to be something in her own right, to serve the realm in ways other

than bearing it sons to be killed in warships.

Surprisingly, her uncle had agreed. If Sally had known more of people instead of academic

psychology she might have realized why. Benjamin Bright Fowler, her father's younger brother, had

inherited nothing, had won his place a leader of the Senate by sheer guts and ability. With no

children of his own, he thought of his brother's only surviving child as his daughter, and he had

seen enough young girls whose only importance was their relatives and their money. Sally and a

classmate had left Sparta with Sally's servants, Adam and Annie, headed for the provinces and the

study of primitive human cultures that the Navy was forever finding. Some planets had not been

visited by starships for three hundred years and more, and the wars had so reduced their

populations that savagery returned.

They were on their way to a primitive colony world, with a stopover at New Chicago to

change ships, when the revolution broke out. Sally's friend Dorothy had been outside the city that

day, and had never been found. The Union Guards of the Committee of Public Safety had dragged

Sally from her hotel suite, stripped her of her valuables, and thrown her into the camp.

In the first days the camp was orderly. Imperial nobility, civil servants, and former

Imperial soldiers made the camp safer than the streets of New Chicago. But day after day the

aristocrats and government officials were taken from the camp and never seen again, while common

criminals were added to the mixture. Adam and Annie found her somehow, and the other inhabitants

of her tent were Imperial citizens, not criminals. She had survived first days, then weeks,

finally months of imprisonment beneath the endless black night of the city's Langston Field.

At first it had been an adventure, frightening, unpleasant, but no worse. Then the rations

had been reduced, and reduced again, and the prisoners began to starve. Near the end the last

signs of order had disappeared. Sanitary regulations were not enforced. Emaciated corpses lay

stacked by the gates for days before the death squads came for them.

It had become an unending nightmare. Her name was posted at the gate: the Committee of

Public Safety wanted her. The other camp inmates swore that Sally Fowler was dead, and since the

guards seldom entered the compound she was saved from whatever fate had overtaken other members of

governing families.

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As conditions became worse, Sally found a new inner strength. She tried to set an example

for others in her tent. They looked to her as their leader, with Adam as her prime minister. When

she cried, everyone was afraid. And so, at age twenty-two standard years, her dark hair a tangled

mess, her clothes filthy and torn and her hands coarse and dirty, Sally could not even throw

herself into a corner and weep. All she could do was endure the nightmare.

Into the nightmare had come rumors of Imperial battleships in the sky above the black dome-

and rumors that the prisoners would be slaughtered before the ships could break through. She had

smiled and pretended not to believe it could happen. Pretended? A nightmare was not real.

Then the marines had crashed through, led by a big blood-covered man with the manners of

the Court and one arm in a sling. The nightmare had ended then, and Sally waited to wake up.

They'd cleaned her, fed her, clothed her-why didn't she wake up? Her soul felt wrapped in cotton.

Acceleration was heavy on her chest. The shadows in the cabin were sharp as razors. The

New Chicago recruits crowded at the windows, chattering. They must be in space. But Adam and Annie

watched her with worried eyes. They'd been fat when first they saw New Chicago. Now the skin of

their faces hung in folds. She knew they'd given her too much of their own food. Yet they seemed

to have survived better than she.

I wish I could cry, she thought. I ought to cry. For Dorothy. I kept waiting for them to

tell me Dorothy had been found. Nothing. She disappeared from the dream. A recorded voice said

something she didn't try to catch. Then the weight lifted from her and she was floating.

Floating. Were they actually going to let her go?'

She turned abruptly to the window. New Chicago glowed like any Earthlike world, its

distinctive patterns unreadable. Bright seas and lands, all the shades of blue smeared with the

white frosting of cloud. Dwindling. As it shrank, she stared out, hiding her face. Nobody should

see that feral snarl. In that moment she could have ordered New Chicago burned down to bedrock.

After inspection, Rod conducted Divine Worship on the hangar deck. They had only just

finished the last hymn when the midshipman of the watch announced that the passengers were coming

aboard. Blaine watched the crew scurry back to work. There would be no free Sundays

while his ship wasn't in fighting trim, no matter what service traditions might say about Sundays

in orbit. Blaine listened as the men went past, alert for signs of resentment. Instead he heard

idle chatter, and no more than the expected grumbling.

"All right, I know what a mote is," Stoker Jackson was saying to his partner. "I can

understand getting a mote in me eye. But how in God's Name can I get a beam there? You tell me

that, now, how can a beam get in a man's eye and him not know it? Ain't reason;"

"You're absolutely right. What's a beam?"

"What's a beam? Oh ho, you're from Tabletop, aren't you? Well, a beam is sawn wood-wood.

It comes from a tree. A tree, that's a great, big..

The voices faded out. Blaine made his way quickly back to the bridge. If Sally Fowler had been the

only passenger he would have been happy to meet her at the hangar deck, but he wanted this Bury to

understand their relationship immediately. It wouldn't do for him to think the captain of one of

His Majesty's warships would go out of his way to greet a Trader.

From the bridge Rod watched the screens as the wedge-shaped craft matched orbit and was

winched aboard, drifting into MacArthur between the great rectangular wings of the hangar doors.

His hand hovered near the intercom switches. Such operations were tricky.

Midshipman Whitbread met the passengers. Bury was first, followed by a small dark man the

Trader didn't bother to introduce. Both wore clothing reasonable for space, balloon trousers with

tight ankle bands, tunics belted into place, all pockets zipped or velcroed closed. Bury seemed

angry. He cursed his servant, and Whitbread thoughtfully recorded the man's comments, intending to

run them through the ship's brain later. The midshipman sent the Trader forward with a petty

officer, but waited for Miss Fowler himself. He'd seen pictures of her.

They put Bury in the Chaplain's quarters, Sally in the First Lieutenant's cabin. The

ostensible reason she got the largest quarters was that Annie, her servant, would have to share

her cabin. The menservants could be bunked down with the crew, but a woman, even one as old as

Annie, couldn't mingle with the men. Spacers off-planet long enough develop new standards of

beauty. They'd never bother a senator's niece, but a housekeeper would be something else. It all

made sense, and if the First Lieutenant's cabin was next to Captain Blaine's quarters, while the

Chaplain's stateroom was a level down and three bulkheads aft, nobody was going to complain.

"Passengers aboard, sir," Midshipman Whitbread reported.

"Good. Everyone comfortable?"

"Well, Miss Fowler is, sir. Petty Officer Allot showed the Trader to his cabin..."

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"Reasonable." Blaine settled into his command seat. Lady Sandra-no, she preferred Sally,

he remembered- hadn't looked too good in the brief moments he'd seen her in the prison camp. The

way Whitbread talked, she'd recovered a bit. Rod had wanted to hide when he first recognized her

striding out of a tent in the prison camp. He'd been covered with blood and dirt-and then she'd

come closer. She'd walked like a lady of the Court, but she was gaunt, half-starved, and great

dark circles showed under her eyes. And those eyes. Blank. Well, she'd had two weeks to come back

to life, and she was free of New Chicago forever.

"I presume you'll demonstrate acceleration stations for Miss Fowler?" Rod asked.

"Yes, sir," Whitbread replied. And null gee practice too, he thought.

Blaine regarded his midshipman with amusement. He had no trouble reading his thoughts.

Well, let him hope, but rank hath its privileges. Besides, he knew the girl; he'd met her when she

was ten years old.

"Signal from Government House," the watch reported.

Cziller's cheerful, careless voice reached him. "Hello, Blaine! Ready to cast off?" The

fleet Captain was slouched bonelessly in a desk chair, puffing on an enormous and disreputable

pipe.

"Yes, sir." Rod started to say something else, but choked it off.

"Passengers settled in all right?" Rod could have sworn his former captain was laughing at

him.

"Yes, sir."

"And your crew? No complaints?"

"You know damned well- We'll manage, sir." Blaine choked back his anger. It was difficult

to be angry with Cziller; after all he'd given him his ship, but blast the man! "We're not

overcrowded, but she'll space."

"Listen, Blaine, I didn't strip you for fun. We just don't have the men to govern here,

and you'll get crew before any get to us. I've sent you twenty recruits, young locals who think

they'll like it in space. Hell, maybe they will. I did."

Green men who knew nothing and would have to be shown every job, but the petty officers

could take care of that. Twenty men would help. Rod felt a little better.

Cziller fussed with papers. "And I'll give you back a couple squads of your Marines,

though I doubt if you'll find enemies to fight in New Scotland."

"Aye aye, sir. Thank you for leaving me Whitbread and Staley." Except for those two,

Cziller and Plekhanov had stripped off every midshipman aboard, and many of the better petty

officers as well. But they had left the very best men. There were enough for continuity. The ship

lived, although some berths looked as if she'd lost a battle.

"You're welcome. She's a good ship, Blaine. Odds are the Admiralty won't let you keep her,

but you may get lucky. I've got to govern a planet with my bare hands. There's not even money!

Only Republic scrip! The rebels took all the Imperial crowns and gave out printed paper. How the

blazes are we going to get real money in circulation?"

"Yes, sir." As a full captain, Rod was in theory equal in rank to Cziller. A brevet

appointment to admiral was for courtesy only, so that captains senior to Cziller could take orders

from him as fleet Captain without embarrassment. But a naval promotion board had yet to pass on

Blaine's admission to post rank, and he was young enough to worry about the coming ordeal. Perhaps

in six weeks time he would be a commander again.

"One point," said Cziller. "I just said there's no money on the planet, but it's not quite

true. We have some very rich men here. One of them is Jonas Stone, the man who let your Marines

into the city. He says he was able to hide his money from the rebels. Well, why not? He was one of

them. But we've found an ordinary miner dead drunk with a fortune in Imperial crowns. He won't say

where he got the money, but we think it was from Bury."

"Yes, sir."

"So watch His Excellency. OK, your dispatches and new crewmen will be aboard within the

hour," Cziller glanced at his computer. "Make that forty-three minutes. You can boost out as soon

as they're aboard." Cziller pocketed the computer and began tamping his pipe. "Give my regards to

MacPherson at the Yards, and keep one thing in mind: if the work on the ship drags, and it will,

don't send memos to the Admiral. It only gets MacPherson mad. Which figures. Instead, bring Jamie

aboard and drink scotch with him. You can't put away as much as he can, but trying to do it'll get

you more work than a memo."

"Yes, sir," Rod said hesitantly. He suddenly realized just how unready he was to command

MacArthur. He knew the technical stuff, probably better than Cziller, but the dozens of little

tricks that you could learn only through experience

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Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle - The mote in God ' s eye

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