The Dragon Never Sleeps by Glen Cook Read Free Book Online Page A

didn't have sense enough to sheer the mooring cables."
    "Or couldn't."
    "It's going to drop on UpTown."
    The disaster was a long time coming, but come it did, the High City settling onto UpTown, UpTown's supports collapsing. Turtle imagined screams running with the thunder. "I'm going to pack."
    "What for?"
    "We have to go do what we can for the survivors."
    "Not tonight." That was Lonesome Mike. "Tonight they're going to be evening scores."
    True. Hell would be in session over there. It had to run its course.
     
    All day a carrion bird of smoke perched on the bones of Merod Schene. With night's fall fires reddened the bird's belly. Turtle stared while the Immunes gathered for the long hike. Midnight complained softly, to no one but herself.
    The grandfather of all fireworks shells burst over the dying city.
    "Nuclear!" somebody yelled. "The blast wave..."
    "No!" Turtle snapped. "There will be no blast wave. Nor any sound."
    "But..."
    "That was a Guardship breaking off the Web. They're here."
    "How could they be?" Midnight demanded. "You said it would take months."
    "It didn't. One must have been at P. Jaksonica. Or near enough to summon quickly. People, get back in the bunker. And pray it isn't
I Primagenia
."

— 13 —
    WarAvocat stared at the wall. The data painted a grim picture. "Communications. Anything from V. Rothica station?"
    "Affirmative, WarAvocat. A warning loop on a STASIS emergency band. General broadcast. Not a beam or pulse."
    "Been a long time," WarAvocat said to First WatchMaster while awaiting data sufficient to determine the number of soldiers to waken.
    Overhead, the Deified fussed and bickered, ignored.
    "Move ship toward station," WarAvocat directed. The visual showed the big wheel naked of shipping.
    "Planetary-based insurrections seldom intrude upon off-planet operations," Kole Marmigus observed from above.
    "This one has. Probe?"
    "There are people alive in there, sir. We're not yet close enough to distinguish their loyalties."
    WarAvocat cast a sharp glance around.
    "I'll handle that, sir," First WatchMaster said.
    "Let it go."
    "I can't let my people smart off to their superiors."
    "Forget it." WarAvocat's gaze locked on the wall. It was bad down below. "Access. Hall of the Soldiers. Warm one regimental combat team for surface action."
    A voice called, "WarAvocat, a small vessel just left station. Looks insystem. A miner or something."
    "Very well."
    Probe added, "There's nothing alive aboard it, sir."
    "Headed this way, sir."
    "Very well." A gnat. "We'll need people to clear the insurrectionists off station. Deified. Any advice? We've not boarded a station in my memory."
    The Deified had access to everything
Gemina
knew. Also, it was politic to consult them occasionally.
    "That miner is accelerating at nine gravs, sir," First WatchMaster noted.
    "Very well."
    Kole Marmigus said, "We suggest a battalion for the assault, WarAvocat."
    "That many?"
    "There are corridors and passages to be held behind the shock force." The Deified vanished. Station schematics replaced him, tactically significant points marked by red dots.
    "More complex than I anticipated." Strate accessed Hall of the Soldiers and ordered appropriate forces warmed.
    "Thirty seconds to impact, WarAvocat."
    "Very well. Put the show on the wall. Split it with one view an approximation of what they'll see from station."
    Two views appeared. One portrayed the wheel of the station, a slim sliver of distant moon, and the onrushing miner. In the other a huge, dingy white, slightly flattened lozenge crawled across the starscape, the miner dwindling toward its immensity.
    "Ten seconds to impact."
    "Battle screen maximum," WarAvocat ordered.
    In the exterior view the Guardship vanished behind an oily shimmer
    "Five seconds to impact. Three. Two. One."
    Both views died in a storm of light.
    Then in the exterior view the Guardship ploughed through the nuclear fury. The great terror had not so much as shivered.
    WarAvocat chuckled. "For a second,