In less than fifty minutes a new optical organ slipped from the purple sheath and wobbled into the air above the nutrient gel like an orange carnation on a stalk of shocking pink.

And now the Battlemaster gazed upon the new world into which it had been reborn.

CHAPTER NINE.

COWDRAY-KARA CITY WAS THE WORLD CAPITAL OF WEXEL AND knew it. The teeming tower park of the downtown section was laced with elevated highways and personnel tubes. The streets were crowded with confident folk, sure of their place in the world. Media centers, theaters, a multitude of restaurants, all competed for the roving human eye.

Luisa Chang had seen it all before, of course, on several different worlds. On Bracken it was the city of Gismar with its spectacular glass towers. On Heimworld it was Krettchen, the city of a thousand bridges.

On Wu it was Changzou and the pagoda of Kusu.

In every case the settlement pattern for these metropolises was broadly similar: layers of suburb in varying density and price bracket, surrounding the dense hub zone with its towers and highways.

On this evening, the rays of the setting sun were striking the rooftops of the towers, producing rainbows and golden reflections that flashed across the city.

From her hotel room on the thirtieth floor of her hotel's slim tower, Luisa enjoyed the view for a few minutes before checking herself in the mirror one last time. Her evening dress uniform was simple but elegant. White shirt, black trousers, and gray jacket with black trim, the ensemble broken solely by the green and red of the small service strip she wore on her left lapel.

Luisa was proud of those colors. She'd fought throughout her career to avoid PDJ (permanent desk job). As a result of her efforts she'd seen action on four separate occasions, if she wanted to include the horror of yesterday morning's shambles in the Skullas Hills.

On that score, however, she was not proud, not at all.

She had already decided not to put in for her fourth red strip, so disgusted was she with her own performance.

The thing had exploded into a catastrophe. Four dead civilians, sixteen dead Regulators, all on top of the eight dead men the Regulators had crucified. The damn thing had been a slaughter. Plus there were a dozen villagers in the hospital with wounds from the firefight.

But she had put Cormondwyke in for a second pip on his combat shield for his action in snuffing out the armored ATV with its twenty-millimeter cannons.

Blake had snorted derisively at that; she still didn't know why.

Cormondwyke certainly deserved the honor. But all the way back to base at Doisy-Dyan Blake had been cold and silent. She had barely spoken to him since.

She shook her head angrily. There was no point in second-guessing it. The Regulators might have killed that many more men themselves. It had to be done. That was the way irregular war always was. A mess, with no clear black and white, no obvious line between what was right and what was disastrous.

Luisa caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. How pale and distracted she appeared. She could hardly imagine herself in less of a mood for the upcoming festivities that she was to be the centerpiece of.

Angrily she shook her head; it was time to snap out of this! She had a job to do. She straightened up, tightened her lips, and did her best to shove it all out of her mind.

Right now she had to concentrate on other matters. She was about to meet the planetary elite. A banquet party on the top floor of the Hotel Zorel, with two hundred selected guests. Satisfied with her appearance, if little else, she left her room and made her way to the elevator banks.

In the elevator there were two couples, also en route to the top floor. Bankers, she guessed, as she exchanged a small tight-lipped smile with them. They wore vibrahide suits in subtle hues of taupe and mauve with full luxurons and genuine leather shoes.

The men were red-faced, bluff types with the look of Extended Life. The women were younger, beautiful leisure girls got up in haute couture for these men.

The rooftop restaurant was large and artificially darkened when she arrived. The reception was already in full swing. People milled about the entrance. Chang wove her way through them.

Inside there was a swarm of introductions to be endured. Luisa found this kind of thing rather intimidating. Worse, on this occasion she was the new CO for ITAA forces on Wexel. The entire focus of the thing would be on her.

She noticed Captain Cachester standing with a group of civilians to one side of the entrance. Beyond this group were tables with pink tablecloths and blue lights. Cachester glanced toward her with cold eyes, then looked away without making eye contact. Of course she knew that Cachester had put in fur another extension. He wanted another five years on Wexel. Luisa wondered idly how much he was racking up for his position. How many of the people in this room had deals going with the handsome Captain Cachester?

Suddenly a portly gentleman in a gleaming blue tuxedo appeared in front of her. His head was crowned with thick, wavy white hair. He performed a stately bow.

"Colonel Chang, welcome."

This was the Baron Vogn-Duvo, the "host" for the evening.

"Colonel Chang, "he said, baring lots of white teeth. "May I welcome you to the city of Cowdray-Kara. I do hope you will enjoy your first visit here."

"I'm sure I will, Baron, my room has the most wonderful view of the tower park."

"Ah, excellent, excellent. This hotel is one of the best we have, and certainly the tallest."

The baron led her on into the room. She took a glass of seltzer-it was too soon for wine-and began the whirl of introductions. Fortunately she had learned the habit of working hard on the briefing material before each new posting. Her work on this occasion paid off almost immediately, for she recognized old Stramber Bascoyne and Dame Urda of Luc right away. They were so stunned to be recognized they forgot all the penetrating, hard little questions they'd wanted to ask.

The baron was good at this sort of thing; he detected the right moment to break away and move onto the next with a fastidious sense of precision. Now he helped her on before Bascoyne could recover his wits.

In succession she met such notables as Muscat of Cablara, Lord Shackdent, and Lady Mong. Several members of the incredibly wealthy Kuang family were there. The Kuangs owned areas the size of countries in the south of Trios continent.

"You were at Kursk, Colonel," the elderly Shackdent said.

"A terrible fight that was."

"It was."

"Did you see combat there, Colonel?"

"On the north continent. I was at the battle of Strantung."

"Ahah, Strantung, eh? Terrible things happened. Terrible events. But it is always so; humanity seethes with rebellious, dangerous urges. The maintenance of control, with law and order, is a task best not even left to human beings. Their hearts are too soft, their pockets too empty."

"There will never be another Kursk, Lord Shackdent. The ITAA has learned that policy must be pressed in such cases and conditions, before the stage of mass war develops."

"But the ITAA is so feeble about crime and liberating! If left to the ITAA there's not one of us that would have two coins to rub together! We get too much interference from the damn ITAA as it is, if you ask me."

Shackdent clearly was most exercised on this issue.

"So you would have left Kursk to destroy itself in endless warfare with modern weapons?" she said coolly.

"Ah, well, no, that would not do," he admitted. "Nobody emerged from Kursk with anything worth having."

"Perhaps you should read the recent reports on Planetary Interventionism. The ITAA doesn't want to be pulled into local conflicts everywhere, but there can't be another Kursk."

"Now, Shackdent, leave her alone," a weird voice said on her left. "We want to meet the new colonel, too."

Chang found a pair of women, in advanced extended age, standing at her elbow. They wore extended luxurons and thus resembled pillars of shimmer, the one gold and the other purple.

Their faces emerged from the shimmer beneath fantastic hairstyles, with elaborate waves and curls. No matter how you looked at them they were very old.

The baron was there at once. "Colonel, may I introduce the Cowdray sisters, Menereth and Gwynalda."

Menereth was slightly the older, by about fifty years, Chang decided, but both were in their third centuries at least.

"Welcome to Cowdray, Colonel. I'm sure you're finding it quite a wonder, are you not?"

That weird voice, like a velvet echo from an unknown past. She smiled back nervously. These women owned the state of Cowdray, or most of it. In the planetary power equation they were the single most powerful variable.

"The city is charming; my room here in the hotel has an excellent view."

"Good. The view is to the north, of course, and that is as it should be."

"Yes, you best remember to keep your eyes north while you're here on Wexel, Colonel Chang,"

Gwynalda said as if she were reproving a child.

"Way down there in that hellhole in Patash-Do, you can pick up unfortunate attitudes. You know it's not our fault the ITAA puts its planetary base in Doisy-Dyan."

"We offered them land in Cowdray, didn't we, Menereth?"

"We certainly did, but they wouldn't take it, oh no. So the poor fools are stuck down there in that backwater."

"I was there once, to see Lucy Wendt before she died. The place was a pit, absolutely revolting."

Chang nodded politely. Doisy-Dyan certainly could use improvements, and eccentricity was to be expected from ancient power brokers like these.

Eventually the sisters moved on and Luisa was confronted with new faces. Still, the phrase "unfortunate attitudes" lingered in her memory. What could it mean? She resolved to investigate the complete history of the base here, as soon as she was back in Doisy-Dyan. There was too much she didn't know yet.

At dinner Luisa received a little relief, since the ITAA diplomatic staff was seated around her in a defensive huddle.

"We made them do it; only way we'd ever get to meet you, I think," said their leader, the consul, a bluff gray-haired man in his fifties named Hauger. He introduced the others: Technical Officer Paltz, Communications Liaison Alisan Bunayel, Audit Controller Feng.

The conversation was light, concerned with shopping in CK City and the difficulties of finding a taxi in some sections of downtown. There were commiserations from everyone on the misfortune of her being based in Doisy-Dyan. It was generally agreed that there wasn't any shopping worth doing in Doisy-Dyan.

"Hellhole!" Changsha Feng said.

"Patash-Do is really about the worst spot on Wexel," Alisan Bunayel said.

"It's the pits," Paltz and Feng murmured together.

"Well," Luisa remarked "it's certainly not like this city."

"On Wexel, there aren't many really large cities, just CKC, Frentana Beach, Dao, a handful of others,"

Alisan said.

"Wexel is a brilliant example of maldevelopment," Audit Controller Feng explained.

"This planet is completely aberrant. Political evolution has been stuck fast for centuries." Helmudt Paltz added.

"Not too loud with that sort of talk, please, Helmudt," Consul Hauger said.

"Always the listeners are working, eh, Consul?" Paltz said in a tone of slight disrespect.

Hauger, however, did not take offense. Chang's eyebrows rose.

"Of course, so you will please remember that fact."

Chang exchanged a look with the consul. Was he another Cachester? It seemed all too likely. Another important thing to add to the list of very important things that had to be done, real soon now, was to investigate the ITAA staffs around Wexel, to sort out all the likely Cachester-like opponents.

For the rest of dinner the conversation remained light discussing the upcoming Cowdray Derby-the most important horse race on Wexel-and the ensuing season of parties and weddings that would follow this inaugural rite of spring.

Later there was music and dancing and more circulating and introductions. Luisa sipped her wine and kept up her official smile and a cool, affable front while she waited for the moment when she could finally escape and go back to her room.

Finally her time was up, and she took a last round of the tables with the baron to make farewells before riding the elevator down to her floor.

She took off the little shoes and padded along the carpeted corridors to her own room.

Inside she switched on the light and leaned back against the wall.

And froze, stunned with surprise.

A man wearing a black cloak and hat, with a white mask on the upper half of his face, was standing there. He had a gun in his hand which he now extended and aimed directly between her eyes. The gun had a bulky silencer attached. It would be virtually soundless.

"Colonel Chang," the man said in a tight voice.

"What do you want?" she said, although her mouth had gone dry and she felt her knees growing a little weak.

"My family has a message for you."

"Your family?"

The black eyes blazed at her. He stepped forward and pressed the barrel against her forehead.

"Don't move or I might have to kill you," he whispered.

"What the hell do you want?" she repeated.

"Stay out of the Skullas Hills, Colonel. We settle our own accounts in Macumbri land. You don't belong in the Skullas.

You come there again and we kill you. Understand?"

She nodded. "I get the message, loud and clear."

"Good, let us hope you learn from it." He produced a small gas bulb in his other hand and squirted it into her face. She lost consciousness in a matter of seconds.