Read The Final Battle for Free Online Page B

up, shaking his head. “Now what the hell was that all about?” he asked.
    “Who knows?” his buddy said. “But I’d bet it was something—” He reached down to pull the whimpering spacer to his feet. “—this sad sack of shit did.”
    • • •
    “Visitor for you,” the intercom said.
    “Piss off,” Michael muttered. He refused to open his eyes even when the cell door opened, furious with himself that he had lost his temper, even more furious that his left wrist had been secured to the bulkhead by a plasfiber restraint.
    “Lieutenant Helfort,” a voice said, a woman’s voice, authoritative and controlled. “I’m Commander Kadar, captain in command of the FWSS
Pilgrim
.”
    Discipline, deeply ingrained, forced Michael to his feet. He snapped to attention. “Apologies, sir,” he blurted. “I didn’t know it was you.”
    “Don’t apologize. Now, first things first.” Kadar turned and waved a marine into the cell. “Get that restraint off. That’s better,” she went on when the man was done. “I’m here to apologize to you. The security holovid showed us what happened. We’ll be taking disciplinary action against Spacer Gillespie.”
    “I’m sorry I lost it,” Michael said.
    “Pity about all this.” Kadar waved a hand at the cell’s sterile white bulkheads. “But rules are rules.”
    “I understand that.”
    “I know you do.” Kadar leaned forward a fraction. “You’re not on your own, Helfort—” Her voice had dropped to the faintest of whispers; Michael struggled to hear her. “—so hang in there.” Kadar stepped back. “Now,” she continued, her voice strong again, “if there is anything you need, just ask. I can’t guarantee you’ll get it, but anything we can do, we will.”
    With that she was gone. Michael wondered just what the hell she’d been talking about.
    Wednesday, August 20, 2403, UD
Offices of the Supreme Council for the Preservation of the Faith, McNair City
    “Michael Wallace Helfort …”
    If the black-gowned judge was troubled by the gravity of the occasion, her voice did not show it.
    “… it is the sentence of this court that you be transferred to a duly authorized place of execution, and there, on the date specified by the minister for planetary security, you be put to death according to law. Take the prisoner down.”
    “Yes!” Chief Councillor Polk hissed. “It’s about time, you piece of Fed garbage.” He scowled. “Months and months they took! Can you believe it, Lou?”
    “That’s the Federated Worlds for you,” Lou Nagaro, Polk’s chief of staff, said. “Very keen on due process.”
    Polk snorted derisively. “I’ll give the assholes due process,” he grunted.
    “At least they got there in the end, Chief Councillor. So how about a glass of champagne to celebrate?”
    “No, not yet,” Polk said with an emphatic shake of the head. “I’ll share a bottle of champagne with you, a good bottle from Old Earth, but only when that man is dead and not before. Now go and find out where Councillor Kando and Colonel Hartspring are. I want to see them.”
    “Sir.”
    Polk waited in silence until Nagaro returned.
    “Kando and Hartspring will be back in McNair tomorrow,” Nagaro said.
    “Good. I want Kando to make sure that the Feds carry through with this, and I don’t care how much we have to spend or who we have to suborn. Helfort must be executed.”
    “I think Kando can make sure of it.”
    “He’d better.”
    “But what about Hartspring? What can a DocSec colonel do?”
    “A lot, Lou, a lot. Michael Helfort might be on his way to the gallows, and none too soon, but death’s not enough for him. I want him to suffer every minute of every day he has left alive. I want him in so much pain that he’ll be begging the Feds to kill him when they strap him into the chair.”
    Skepticism flitted across Nagaro’s face. “Forgive me, Chief Councillor, but how can we do that? The Feds will have Helfort locked away where nobody can