Flagship by Mike Resnick Read Free Book Online

brutality. "You are the finest warrior I've ever seen, maybe the finest there's ever been. If I had a hundred like you I could conquer the galaxy." He paused. "I just wish somewhere along the way they'd given you a course in peacemaking or maybe ethics."
    "I learned at a harder school," she replied.
    "I know."
    "The bars and whorehouses are filled with women who learned how to make accommodations," said Val. "I'm not one of them."
    "I value you for what you are," Cole assured her. "I was just musing about what you might have been."
    "I might have been a five-foot-tall hunchback with a prosthetic leg and steel teeth," she said.
    "Point taken."
    "So what do you thinks waiting for us on Cicero?" asked Val.
    Cole shrugged. "We'll know soon enough."
    Suddenly she smiled. "If it bites, I'll protect you."
    "Fine," said Cole. "And if it kisses, I'll protect it. I've seen you wear out the androids in that brothel back on Singapore Station."
    "I go there because they're the only ones I can't wear out," she replied with a laugh.
    Cole and Val both experienced a sudden sense of disorientation.
    "I guess we've entered the wormhole," he said.
    "I guess," she replied, getting up from the table. "I'm going to grab two hours of sleep, just in case there's some fighting to do when we get there."
    "We'll wake you if we need you."
    Then she was gone, and Cole ordered his coffee and sandwich. They arrived, he took a bite of the mock hamburger, and made a face, wondering why after all these millennia soya products still tasted more like soybeans than all the things they were supposed to taste like.
    He spent another half hour finishing his sandwich, sipping his coffee, and getting the details of Sokolov's three conquests after the pilot filed a report with Christine. He was about to go to his cabin when the Platinum Duke wandered in, sat down at his table, and ordered some coffee, artificial eggs, mock steak, and something that wasn't quite toast.
    "Good evening," said Cole.
    "It's my morning," answered the Duke.
    "Don't burn your lips on the coffee," said Cole as the Duke's meal arrived. "It's very hot."
    "I don't have any lips," said the Duke, lifting the cup to his mouth. A moment later he cursed and put it down. "I do have a tongue, though."
    "You heard that your beloved Singapore Station is unscathed and probably turning a hell of a profit."
    "You were right," said the Duke. "I still don't like running and hiding."
    "You're running and hiding," replied Cole. " We're running and attacking."
    "I think I liked you better when you were a customer," said the Duke.
    "I liked you better when you supplied me with elegant meals from your private kitchen."
    The Duke chuckled. "We had a good thing going. David and I would line up lucrative contracts, and you and the Teddy R would fulfill them." He paused. "How the hell did we get from there to here in so short a time?"
    "We had help," said Cole grimly.
    "Yes," agreed the Duke, remembering the attack on Singapore Station and the events that had precipitated it.
    They sat in silence for a few moments. Then Cole felt a familiar wave of dizziness, and realized that they had emerged from the worm-hole and would now be approaching the Cicero system. If Briggs or Christine were looking for signs of the Navy, it could be an hour before the Teddy R left the vicinity of the wormhole. Jacovic would take half that time and be almost as thorough—and Val, if she was on duty, would glance at the viewscreen, declare the area free of Navy ships, and hope she was wrong as she proceeded to Cicero.
    The Duke finished his meal and left. Cole was on his third cup of coffee when the all-clear signal came through and the Teddy R lurched forward.
    "Sir, would you like to come to the bridge and take command?" asked Christine.
    He stared at her image. Unspoken was the fact that she had been promoted to Second Officer for her loyalty and her other skills, but that she was totally unversed in spacial warfare.
    "You're in charge