Prostitutes were already working the plaza. Daniel saw a statuesque blond man approach a commando in the door arch. He left laughing, but without doing business at least for the moment.
An APC ran its fans up in the gardens to the rear of the palace. The vehicle lifted just high enough to be seen as movement beyond the building's mass, then curved south in the direction of the Navy Pool. Sporadic gunfire continued across the city, and a red glow to the west hinted of fire.
A squad of guards with Zojira armbands stood in front and to the left of the main door; there were three Alliance commandoes to the right. The Kostromans talked loudly to one another, waving their weapons and passing a bottle of plum brandy. Empty bottles lay nearby in the entrance alcove, some of them smashed.
The Zojiras were in a reasonably good mood: they were alive, and the flaccid bodies of their Hajas predecessors were an immediate reminder of the alternative. Nonetheless they were drunk and too excited to be safe with automatic weapons.
That was another reason Daniel stepped directly to the sergeant in charge of the trio of Alliance commandoes to say in a calm, quiet, voice, "I'm Lieutenant Benno Candace, signals lieutenant on the staff of Grand Admiral Sanaus. I'm here to collect written instructions on the navy's employment and bring them to Admiral Sanaus. Can you tell me where the Elector is?"
Just-landed Alliance soldiers wouldn't realize that Daniel spoke Universal with a non-Kostroman accent. If his luck was really bad, though, one of them might recognize a Cinnabar accent.
For that matter, Daniel didn't know the name of the new Elector; he thought he was lucky to recognize Zojira black and gold. It wasn't likely that a commando would ask him the Elector's name. It was even more unlikely the Alliance troops really gave a fuck which fucking wog thought he was in charge of this fucking piss-pot planet, but you could never tell.
On the other hand, you could be hit by a meteor while lying in bed. It didn't do to worry about things you couldn't change.
"What're you telling me for?" the sergeant growled. "Do I look like a guide dog? Go ask somebody inside."
"Thank you, sergeant," Daniel said with obsequious politeness. He stepped past the nearest Zojira and entered the vestibule.
None of the local guards had heard the exchange in detail, but they weren't going to interfere with a man the Alliance troops had passed. If they tried, there was a fair chance that the commandoes would back Daniel out of sheer bloody-mindedness and feelings of superiority.
It would only take one thing going wrong for Daniel to become another tacky smear like the one he walked around on the mosaic just inside the doorway. There'd been a half-hearted attempt to mop up the mess, but bits of lung tissue as well as blood still stuck to the patterned stone.
The desks in the anteroom had been smashed either in the fighting or in an orgy of destruction that had more to do with mobs than it did with war. Somebody'd emptied a submachine gun across the furniture to the left, blowing out bright yellow splinters of wood and fountains of shredded paper.
The head clerk Daniel remembered from his first visit knelt among the wreckage, trying to piece together torn files. None of his fellows were present. Daniel stepped past quickly to hide himself in a group of noncombatants wearing Zojira colors. It was unlikely that the old clerk could have recognized anyone through his tear-brimming eyes.
Daniel turned to the right and walked purposefully down the corridor past open offices. The lights were on in most, but the people who'd ransacked them had generally passed on.
Occasionally he saw armed Zojiras who drank and broke up furniture. They eyed Daniel, but the only direct challenge he received was from a woman sprawled against the wall facing the doorway. She waved a half bottle of brandy and called, "Hey! I could use what you got, handsome!"
He couldn't imagine circumstances in which he'd be flattered by attention from that particular quarter.
The Zojiras were a major clan, but the coup had required very large forces to cover all the critical locations. The Alliance commandoes provided backbone and heavy weapons, but they didn't know the city and couldn't number more than a battalion even if they and their equipment had been packed into the just-landed transport like sardines.
To get the necessary numbers, the planners had recruited anybody willing to point a gun at fellow-citizens. Real discipline was impossible, and at least half the additional personnel must be criminals. The new regime would find the apparatus of government smashed. They'd be lucky if Kostroma City weren't burned to the ground besides.
The stairs to the basement and subbasement were in an alcove off the corridor, much like the one on the third floor that held the ladder to the roof. At the rear of the palace was a broad flight of steps which was the usual entrance to the dank arches of the basement, but only low-ranking clerks worked there. Daniel thought he'd call less attention on himself by entering the front instead of having people wonder why a naval lieutenant was going down to the basement.