Final Assault Read Free Page A

commtorps inventory."
    Face flushing angrily, A'Nal turned back to his prisoners. "You must be feeling very smug. We'll see how you feel after interrogation.
    "Escort the commodore and the commander to the Tower," he ordered, "and remand them to the custody of the commandant."
    D'Trelna shook off the hands that reached for his arms. "What did you do in the war, Colonel?" he asked.
    "In the war?" repeated A'Nal, staring uneasily at D'Trelna's battle ribbons.
    "He means the ten-year war with the S'Cotar," said N'Trol helpfully. "The one that ended this year."
    "My record's none of your concern," said the colonel. "But it's one I'm proud of—I was assigned to ground headquarters of the Home Fleet."
    "In what capacity?" asked L'Wrona. "Budget officer."
    "Interesting," said DTrelna. "How'd you go from budget officer to colonel in a combat arm?"
    "Get them out of here," A'Nal ordered a sergeant. The NCO took the commodore's arm, steering him toward the doors. N'Trol and his escort followed.
    "Luck, H'Nar," called DTrelna as they took him away.
    "Luck, J'Quel, N'Trol," said the captain. Alone on the bridge, he and A'Nal faced each other.
    "You're correct—I can't arrest you," said the gray-uniformed officer. "I'd be very careful, though, if I were you, My Lord. Stay out of this. Go back to UTria—they need you there, now that the war's over." With a curt nod, he turned and left the bridge.
    "The real war's only just begun, Colonel," said L'Wrona softly. Alone on the big old ship, he watched the convoy disappear into the heat of midday, then turned and left the ship.
    Terra. A speck of nothingness on the spiral arm of our galaxy. Which is, of course, why the Empire—or certain members of the Empire—chose to build on Terra's moon a cybernetic guardian that would, when the moment was right, create and unleash into our somnolent Confederation an aggressor race, to "prepare" us for the "real" enemy, those long-forgotten AIs who lived just a universe away. That this cybernetic guardian, some five thousand years after the fall of the Empire, chose to create such a formidable lifeform as the S'Cotar biofabs, made the contest all too real. That we won was a miracle; that we will ever be entirely rid of the S'Cotar plague unlikely. It can only be done planet by planet, nest by nest. And it can only be done by the Watchers.
    Colonel S'Rel
    Report to the Confederation Council Archives Reference 518.392.671 AI
    c
    2
    "What are you trying to tell me, S'Rel?" said Sutherland, interrupting the Watcher in mid-evasion.
    The K'Ronarin stopped speaking, then leaned forward, fists on the CIA director's desk. "Very well, Sutherland. I'll be blunt. My men and I have been ordered back to K'Ronar —we leave Terra tomorrow."
    "Leave? Tomorrow?" Sutherland heard himself stammer.
    S'Rel nodded. "Repulse is going home. We're to go with her."
    "Repulse is pulling out?"
    S'Rel nodded.
    "Is she being replaced?"
    "No."
    Sutherland slumped back in his chair. "My God, S'Rel—you're leaving this planet defenseless against ..."
    "Against nothing," said S'Rel, walking to the big picture window with its view of the Potomac Palisades. A wiry, pale-complexioned man in his thirties, dressed for the weather in a short sleeve plaid shirt and denim pants, he stared across the sullen brown river at Washington.
    "Against nothing," he repeated, turning back to Sutherland, hands clasped behind his back. "That nest in the Mato Grosso was the last of them. There are no more traces on Terra. We've wiped all the S'Cotar on your world."
    It had been a swift, flawlessly executed operation. Without warning, Repulse had moved out of stationary orbit, heading outsystem at speed, protests from a hundred nations rippling in its wake as the radar reports came in. Ambassador Z'Sha had only just issued an uninformative statement when the destroyer suddenly reappeared over Brazil, missile and fusion batteries sending a thin-stream of death into the atmosphere—a fierce rain of ordnance