She lifted her name tag so it glittered in the aircraft lights.LIEUTENANTVICTORY LIGHTHILL. "Don't worry, Sergeant. What you and Dad and Mother started is going to last a long time."

FORTY-SIX

Belga Underville was getting a bit tired of Lands Command. It seemed that she was down here almost ten percent of the time—and it would be a lot more if she hadn't become a heavy telecomm user. Colonel Underville had been head of Domestic Intelligence since 60//15, more than half the past Bright Time. It was a truism—at least in modern times—that the end of the Brightness was the beginning of the bloodiest wars. She had expected things to be rough, but not like this.

Underville got to the staff meeting early. She was more than a little nervous about what she intended; she had no desire to cross the chief, but that was exactly how her petition might look. Rachner Thract was already there, getting his own show in order. Grainy, ten-color reconnaissance photos were projected on the wall behind him. Apparently he'd found more Southlander launch sites—further evidence of Kindred aid for "the potential victims of Accord treachery." Thract nodded civilly as she and her aides sat down. There was always some friction between External Intelligence and Domestic. External played by rules that were unacceptably rough for domestic operations, yet they always found excuses for meddling. The last few years, things had been especially tense between Thract and Underville. Since Thract had screwed up in Southland, he'd been much easier to handle.Even the end of the world can have short-term advantages, Belga thought sourly.

Underville flipped through the agenda. God, the crackpot distractions. Or maybe not: "What do you think about these high-altitude bogies, Rachner?" It was not meant as an argumentative question; Thract should not be in trouble when it came to air defense.

Thract's hands jerked in abrupt dismissal. "After all the screaming, Air Defense claims only three sightings. ‘Sightings' my ass. Even now that we know about Kindred antigravity capabilities, they still can't track the cobbers properly. Now the AD Director claims the Kindred have some launch site I don't know about. You know the chief is going to stick me with finding it....Damn!" Underville couldn't tell if that was his one-word summary answer, or if he had just noticed something obnoxious in his notes. Either way, Thract didn't have anything more to say to her.

The others were trickling in now: Air Defense Director Dugway (seating himself on a perch far from Rachner Thract), the Director of Rocket Offense, the Director of Public Relations. The chief herself entered, followed almost immediately by the King's Own Finance Minister.

General Smith called the meeting to order, and formally welcomed the Finance Minister. On paper, Minister Nizhnimor was her only superior short of the King himself. In fact, Amberdon Nizhnimor was an old crony of Smith's.

The bogies were first on the agenda, and it went about as Thract had predicted. Air Defense had done further crunching on the three sightings. Dugway's latest computer analysis confirmed that these were Kindred satellites, either pop-up recon jobs or maybe even the tests of a maneuvering antigravity missile. Either way, none of them had been seen twice. And none of them had been launched from any of the known Kindred sites. The director of Air Defense was very pointed about the need for competent ground intelligence from within Kindred territory. If the enemy had mobile launchers, it was essential to learn about them. Underville half-expected Thract to explode at the implication that his people had failed once more, but the Colonel accepted AD's sarcasm and General Smith's expected orders with impassive courtesy. Thract knew that this was the least of his problems; the last item on today's agenda was his real nemesis.

Next up, Public Relations: "I'm sorry. There's no way we can call a War Plebiscite, much less win one. People are more frightened than ever, but the time scales make a Plebiscite flatly unworkable." Belga nodded; she didn't need some flack from Public Relations for this insight. Within itself, the King's Government was a rather autocratic affair. But for the last nineteen generations, since the Covenant of Accord, its civil power had been terrifyingly limited. The Crown retained sole title to its ancestral estates such as Lands Command, and had limited power of taxation, but had lost the exclusive right to print money, the right of eminent domain, the right to impress its subjects into military service. In peacetime, the Covenant worked. The courts ran on a fee system, and local police forces knew they couldn't get too frisky or they might encounter real firepower. In wartime, well, that's what the Plebiscite was for—to suspend the Covenant for a certain time. It had worked during the Great War, just barely. This time around, things moved so fast that just talking about a Plebiscite might precipitate a war. And a major nuclear exchange could be over in less than a day.

General Smith accepted the platitudes with considerable patience. Then it was Belga's turn. She went through the usual catalogue of domestic threats. Things were under control, more or less. There were significant minorities that loathed the modernization. Some were already out of the picture, asleep in their own deepnesses. Others had dug themselves deep redoubts, but not to sleep in; these would be a problem if things went really bad. Hrunkner Unnerby had worked more of his engineering miracles. Even the oldest towns in the Northeast had nuclear electricity now, and—just as important—weatherized living space. "But of course not much of this is hardened. Even a light nuclear strike would kill most of these people, and the rest wouldn't have the resources for a successful hibernation." In fact, most of those resources had been spent on creating the power plants and underground farms.

General Smith gestured at the others. "Comments?" There were several. Public Relations suggested buying in to some of the hardened enterprises; he was already planning for after the end of the world, the bloody-minded little wimp. The chief just nodded, assigned Belga and the wimp to look into the possibility. She checked the Domestic Intelligence report off her copy of the agenda.

"Ma'am?" Belga Underville raised a hand. "I do have one more item I'd like to bring up."

"Certainly."

Underville brushed her eating hands nervously across her mouth. She was committed now. Damn. If only the Finance Minister weren't here. "I—Ma'am, in the past you have been very, um, generous in your management of subordinate operations. You give us the job, and let us do it. I have been very grateful for that. Recently though, and very likely this is without your precise knowledge, people from your inner staff have been making unscheduled visits"—midnight raids, actually—"on domestic sites in my area of responsibility."

General Smith nodded. "The Lighthill team."

"Yes, ma'am."Your own children, running around as though they werethe King's Inspectors General. They were full of crazy, irrational demands, shutting down good projects, removing some of her best people. More than anything, it made her suspect that the chief's crazy husband still had great influence. Belga hunkered down on her perch. She really didn't have to say more. Victory Smith knew her well enough to see she was upset.

"On these inspection visits, did Lighthill find anything significant?"

"In one case, ma'am." One fairly serious problem that Belga was sure she would have pounced on herself inside of another ten days. Around the table, Underville could see that most of the others were simply surprised by the complaint. Two nodded faintly in her direction—she already knew about them. Thract tapped an angry tattoo on the table; he seemed about to jump into the fray. It was no surprise that he had been targeted by the chief's nepotistic crew, butplease God, grant him the cleverness to keep hismaw shut. Thract was already in such poor standing that his support would be about as much help as a steel anvil to a racing-climber.