Ghost of a Chance - Mark Garland [60]
Their civilization had been around for millions of years. Even longer than the Televek themselves. Artisans at heart, the lot of them. And their cities in space were simply remarkable. He had spent some time there in his youth listening to music, and he still remembered the name of one particularly alluring windwhyle player he'd met at the East Ocean Symphonic Review, and the many talents she embodied.
Gantel had been only a third associate then, and the stars knew there were more than enough eager associates of every rank scrambling to climb up one more rung on the ladder of success.
But as luck would have it--though to this day he had never admitted that luck had anything to do with it--he had come into possession of a phase-shifted payload device capable of delivering any obtainable warhead to any programmable point inside virtually any fixed defensive barrier.
In the end, of course, he had sold the delivery system to the Thaitifa, and they had used it to great effect against the Vanolens. The sale was what mattered, after all, not the ones who had died, not even the real estate that had been obliterated, and in the end he had been able to find comfort in that belief--that and the fact that the Thaitifa had paid the most ridiculous price imaginable, a boon that by itself had propelled Gantel to first associate at his next evaluation.
It had been the right choice. And in any case, if he hadn't closed the deal, some other associate would have, sooner or later.
His one true regret was that the delivery units he had sold the Thaitifa were the only ones he'd had on hand. Before he was able to obtain more, the Garn, from whom he had purchased the weapons--a race of methane-breathing quadrupeds who, during negotiations, had given new meaning to words like "challenging" and "awkward"--had managed to lose the war they were fighting, and lose it in a big way. There had been nothing left but ashes by the time Gantel got around to going back.
With a sigh Gantel meandered back across the room and, from one of the taps over the microbar, drew an icy glass of berry juice--a blend selected from nine different worlds, a combination of flavors to please any palate. He drank it all. It tasted wonderful. He was coming out of the dark pool now, exorcising his doubt, feeling better.
He had met with failure more than once along the way, the price of taking chances, but throughout his celebrated career Gantel had managed to find a way to cover up his worst setbacks, usually by placing most of the blame on someone else; and to be sure he had closed on many a marginal deal, snatched breakthroughs from the jaws of calamity, fooled the sharpest opponents into trusting him completely, and turned the needs and suffering of others into opportunity and profit many times over.
Drenar Four was no exception, he told himself, setting his glass down.
"Enta sa tnoai," he said out loud, quoting in the ancient tongue: "Seize the deal."
He focused once more on the situation at hand. The cruiser's shields had been repaired, and Gantel was relatively certain that the Federation ship's photon torpedoes could not collapse them, at least not in a first volley. And without any shields of its own, the Federation vessel would not survive long enough to fire many rounds.
Triness would see to that.
Jonal and the others were doing a fair job under the circumstances; they were as capable a team as any he had fielded in some time. The trouble was, like most Televek, Gantel hated to rely on others, an instinct the Televek had retained since prehistoric times. But civilization, and success itself, usually required the delegation of responsibility. A director, certainly, must direct.
Moreover, his