by Timothy Zahn
And with that, the divider returned to its default position of being unlocked.
“The Human’s footsteps have faded from my other Eye’s hearing,” the Modhri murmured. “Do we open the divider?”
“Not yet,” I said, kneeling on the curve couch and pressing my ear against the divider. “We have to wait until Kennrick gets back and disarms the automatic strangler setup. Defender, better have your partner start his scratching again.” I frowned as a sudden thought struck me. “He can’t actually dig all the way through the seal, can he?”
“No,” Sarge said. But I could hear the disapproval in his voice. Letting passengers aboard tenders was broken rule number one; even pretending to do damage to one of their own Quadrails was broken rule number two. In his place, I decided, I would probably be unhappy, too.
For almost two minutes nothing happened. I was starting to wonder if Kennrick had decided to make a camp out in the corridor after all when I half heard, half felt a faint thud. There was a short pause, another thud—
“He has returned,” Sarge confirmed as he picked up the commentary from the defender hanging outside the opaqued window. “He carries the oxygen tank with him.”
I started to breathe again. It was nearly over. Kennrick had jumped perfectly through every hoop I’d set in front of him. All he had to do now was disarm the automatic strangler, reconnect the door trip wires to guard against intrusion from that direction, and then take the oxygen tank to the bed and start rigging it for his use if and when the defender made it though his window seal. I pressed my ear a little harder against the divider, even though I knew I’d never pick up the subtle sound or vibration of Kennrick heaving the oxygen tank onto the bed.
Which meant I was completely unprepared for the sudden thump that bounced against the divider right beside my ear. “What was that?” I whispered urgently. “Defender? Where the hell—?”
“He has seated himself on the curve couch,” Sarge reported. “He is working on the pressurization tank’s valve.”
I felt the blood freeze in my veins. Kennrick wasn’t supposed to be on the curve couch. He was supposed to be on the bed, like he’d been every other time I’d come in here. He was supposed to be concentrating so hard on his new oxygen tank and the Spider hanging outside his window that he wouldn’t notice the divider open the crucial few centimeters I needed.
But he wasn’t on the bed. He was on the curve couch, which would start retracting into the divider the instant I touched the control. There was no way in hell he could possibly miss that.
The Modhri must have sensed my sudden turmoil. “What is it?” he murmured.
“I need to open the divider without him noticing,” I said grimly. “And I need him in front of the gap where I can see him, not way off to the side the way he is now.”
“I see,” the Modhri said calmly. “Do you still have the bypass mimic you took from Logra Emikai?”
“Uh …” I floundered, caught off balance by the sudden change in subject. “Yes, I’ve got it. Why?”
“Give it to me,” the Modhri said, holding out his hand.
I stared at him. What in the world was he up to? “It doesn’t work on Spider locks,” I said.
“I don’t need it to,” the Modhri said, his hand still outstretched. “You wish the Human Kennrick in front of the opening. I will make that happen.”
Trusting the Modhri, the words whispered through my mind. But time was running out, and I didn’t have anything better to suggest. Digging the flat gray box out of my pocket, I handed it over.
“Thank you,” the Modhri said, fingering it thoughtfully. “Stay quiet, and stand well clear.” He looked at the defender. “You, too,” he added.
The defender seemed to think it over. Then, with obvious reluctance, he stepped all the way back to the compartment door. I took advantage of the moment to climb off the curve couch and press myself against its end, a meter from the wall where the divider would be opening.
The Modhri waited until we were set, then stepped over to the divider control. “Stand ready,” he told me, and touched the control.
The divider started sliding open. It had barely cleared the wall when I heard an explosive curse from the other side of the widening gap. “What the—? Compton? Compton, damn you—”
“Not Compton,” the Modhri called hastily through to him. “I am Osantra Qiddicoj. I have come to make you a bargain.”
“What the—how did you get in there?” Kennrick snarled, and I could hear the subtle shift in the sound of his voice as he moved away from the collapsing curve couch.
“With this,” the Modhri said, poking the corner of the bypass mimic through the still-opening divider. I tensed, but almost before I could start to wonder if he’d forgotten about Bayta he touched the control again, stopping the divider at just the right position. “It’s a duplicate of the locksmith’s bypass mimic Compton took from Logra Emikai. I offer it to you as part of a—”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Kennrick demanded. “The damn thing doesn’t work on Spider locks. Compton said so.”
“Compton was wrong,” the Modhri countered, wiggling the mimic as if to emphasize his words. “I bought this spare from Logra Emikai, who showed me its secret. I offer it to you now in exchange for your secret of bringing death aboard the Quadrail.”
Abruptly, he snatched the mimic out of the gap, and I caught a glimpse of Kennrick’s fingertips as he grabbed for the device. “Give it here,” Kennrick snarled.
“Not until you swear to the bargain,” the Modhri said firmly. “With this you can move to a different room, where the Spider attacking you cannot—”
And right in the middle of a sentence, he collapsed abruptly into a heap on the floor, the mimic clattering against the deck as it fell from suddenly nerveless fingers.
“Nice try, Compton,” Kennrick called from the other side of the divider. “You really think I’m that stupid?”
I pressed harder against the divider, gesturing to Sarge to likewise keep silent and motionless. Kennrick had obviously used the kwi on Qiddicoj … but with Bayta still unconscious, I knew for a fact the kwi hadn’t worked. Qiddicoj was faking, lying supposedly unconscious with the perfect bait lying millimeters from his hand.
“I know you’re in there, Compton,” Kennrick bit out, raising his voice over the scraping sound of the defender outside his window. “Come out right now, or I’m going to start cutting off your girlfriend’s fingers.”
I clenched my teeth, my eyes riveted on the mimic. Because it was the perfect bait, and Kennrick had to know that. If he could get it to work on Spider locks, then every compartment in these two cars would be open to him. He could move himself and his hostage back and forth between rooms, resetting his traps and strangle lines, keeping himself clear of whatever the defenders tried to do to pin him down or root him out.
“You hear me, Compton?” Kennrick called again. “Show yourself. Now.”
Only the Modhri had forgotten one crucial detail. The rigged vestibule had been sealed by means of a purely mechanical pressure lock, with nothing that a key or bypass mimic could do anything about. If Kennrick paused long enough to wonder how Qiddicoj had gotten through that, this whole house of cards would collapse.
“Compton?” Kennrick called. The light coming through the gap shifted subtly, and I had the sense that he was now pressing his eye against the opening, trying to see as much of the room as he could. “Compton? Last chance before I start cutting her.”
I took a careful breath. He was going for it, I realized with cautiously rekindled hope. He was still calling for me, but he was no longer sure I was really here. Either he hadn’t thought about the vestibule question, or he didn’t realize the pressure lock couldn’t be triggered remotely, or he was desperate enough to take the risk.
I gathered my feet under me, ready to push off the partially collapsed curve couch the minute he made his move. I would have only one shot at this …
And then, without w
arning, Kennrick’s left hand darted through the gap and grabbed the mimic.
I shoved off the couch toward him, knowing even as I did so I would be too late.
But as Kennrick had mistakenly written the Modhri out of his calculations, so had I. Even as Kennrick’s fingers closed around the mimic, Qiddicoj’s limp hand came suddenly to life, darting up to lock itself around Kennrick’s wrist.
Kennrick gave a startled curse, twisting his arm against Qiddicoj’s thumb to try to break the grip. Qiddicoj held on gamely, but Kennrick was stronger and had better leverage, and half a second later he was free.
But a half second was all I needed. I reached them as Kennrick started to pull the mimic back through the gap, locking my own fingers around the man’s wrist with all the strength adrenaline-flooded muscles could manage.
Kennrick yelped in pain as I yanked his arm hard toward me, slamming his shoulder against the edge of the divider, his face contorted with rage as he glared through the gap at me. “I knew it,” he spat. “Clever, Compton. Now go to hell!” Lifting his right arm over his head, he pointed the kwi at me and jammed his thumb against the trigger.
“Sorry, Kennrick,” I gritted. “Afraid you’re out of bullets.”
His face twisted even more viciously as he thumbed the kwi again. “So now what?” he retorted as he lowered his arm. “You still can’t come in here without killing her. What are you going to do, stand there holding my wrist all the way to Venidra Carvo?”
“No,” I said as I reached with my left hand around to the small of my back. The worst rule-breaking of all, I reflected, a request which Sarge had nearly vetoed even with both Bayta and me pleading my case. “I’m going to dispense justice.”
And with that, I brought my Beretta around to the front, the weapon that had been in a lockbox beneath the train until I’d talked Sarge into sending his partner to retrieve it. Pressing it against Kennrick’s side beneath the arm I was holding, I pulled the trigger.
The blast was deafening in the enclosed space. For a second Kennrick just stared at me, his eyes wide and disbelieving. Then his legs collapsed, and he fell to the floor, landing with his torso twisted awkwardly against the wall as I continued to grip his wrist.
“It is over?” Sarge asked.
I took a deep breath and let go of Kennrick’s arm. It dropped limply to his side, the impact sending a small ripple through the blood already spreading through the carpet. Find the murderer, Givvrac had appealed to me with his last breath. And kill him.
Sometimes people did indeed get what they wished for.
“Yes, it’s over,” I told Sarge quietly, gazing at the eyes now staring their residual astonishment at the compartment’s ceiling. “Tell the mites to get busy—I want them through the ceiling as soon as possible, and never mind the mess. And you can tell the other defender he can come back inside.”
I leaned forward and peered through the gap. Bayta was lying on the floor, her breathing slow and even, the loops of now useless strangling wire glittering around her neck. As I gazed at her, the scraping from the window stopped, replaced by a sort of mice-in-the-wall sound as the mites set to work on the ceiling.
Beneath my feet, I felt Qiddicoj stir. “May I?” the Modhri asked.
“Sorry,” I apologized, stepping clear and offering my hand.
He ignored it, getting to his feet without assistance. “A straightforward yet effective plan,” he commented, peering through the gap at Kennrick’s body. “My congratulations.”
“Thank you,” I said. “Much as I hate to say this, I owe you.”
“You know the repayment I desire,” he said, his voice hardening as he gazed into my eyes. “The method of death used by the Human Kennrick must never be allowed to become public.”
“It won’t,” I promised. “And now that we know how it was done, we should be able to tweak the Spiders’ sensors to keep it from happening again.”
“Good.” Qiddicoj’s long Filly face twitched in a wry smile. “After all, I hope someday to rule the galaxy. I can’t achieve that goal if the Quadrail system is destroyed.”
I felt my stomach tighten. “No, of course not,” I agreed. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t wish you luck with that.”
He inclined his head to me. “Then with your permission I’ll return to my fellow passengers.” He smiled again. “Osantra Qiddicoj will be chagrined to discover that he slept through these momentous events.”
“As will Krel Vevri, no doubt,” I agreed. “I presume he’s on his way back, too?”
“Yes,” Qiddicoj confirmed. “Farewell, Compton. I will most likely not speak to you again.” “Likewise,” I said.
I watched as he crossed to the door and disappeared out into the corridor. “There will be repercussions from this,” Sarge warned.
“There are repercussions from every action,” I said. With the excitement over, I was suddenly very tired. “That’s the way of things.”
Sarge seemed to digest that. “I will take your weapon now.”
I’d almost forgotten the Beretta still hanging loosely in my grip. “Yes, of course,” I said, putting on the safety and handing it over. “Back to the lockbox, I presume?”
“Immediately,” he said, taking the weapon with one leg and folding it up beneath his metal sphere. Tapping his way to the door, he left the compartment.
I turned again to the opening. Yes, there would be repercussions. Possibly very serious ones.
But we would deal with them as they arose. Right now, all I cared about was that Bayta was alive.
With one last look at Kennrick’s frozen eyes, I settled down to listen to the mites working overhead, and to watch Bayta sleep.
TWENTY-TWO
It took the mites three hours of banging, pounding, and unfastening to clear a corner of the ceiling enough for them to squeeze through. Bayta was awake for most of that time, and I spent a good deal of it bringing her up to speed on what had happened, as well as how the devil’s bargain I’d made had worked out.
Even here at the payoff, I could tell she still wasn’t happy about the deal. But at least she had the grace to simply thank me for my efforts, and to not argue any further about my methods.
Once the mites were through, the rest was easy. They traced all of the wires that Kennrick had laid out, confirmed that all but the obvious ones were dummies, carefully cut the ones that weren’t, and Bayta was finally free.
We left the two defenders in the compartment with Kennrick’s body and headed back through the deserted compartment car to announce that the crisis was over and that everyone could start heading back to their compartments. “I was only off by an hour,” I commented to Bayta as we passed the jammed vestibule door that Sarge had wrecked. It wasn’t going to stay wrecked long; a half-dozen mites were already working on it. “I said things would be back to normal in six hours, and it only took us seven.”
“And you probably could have let them back while the mites were working on the ceiling,” Bayta pointed out.
“I didn’t want to risk any of them getting a look at Kennrick’s body as it was dragged out dripping blood,” I said. “Aside from the gruesomeness of the whole thing, I didn’t want them wondering what I’d used to open up that size hole in his chest. You’ll let me know when they’ve got him to the tender, right?”
“Yes,” she said. “A shame it had to end this way. We might have learned more about Mr. Hardin’s plan if we’d been able to question him.”
I shook my head. “Kennrick would have been trained to hold out against all the more popular forms of interrogation,” I said. “In retrospect, I’m guessing now that he was part of Du-Noeva’s team, that spy Westali was after when we raided Shotoko Associates eleven years ago. In fact, he was probably the one who killed those Westali agents guarding the east door. How he hooked up with Hardin I can only guess.”
“I imagine a man with Mr. Hardin’s resources has many interesting contacts.” Bayta paused. “Thank you for not arguing over the reader, by the
way.”
“You mean not arguing more than I did?”
“If you want to put it that way.”
“No problem,” I assured her, fudging the truth just a little. I’d really, really wanted a chance to go through Kennrick’s reader before the defenders took it away. Larry Hardin wasn’t the type to load all his oranges in one crate—the fact that he’d apparently had Kennrick already prepped and ready to take over my slot the minute I’d resigned from his payroll showed that much. I doubted this was the only plan he had in the works for taking over the Quadrail, and I wanted to see if Kennrick had taken any notes on possible future shenanigans.
But the defenders had been adamant about taking the reader and Kennrick together as a package, and I’d had enough fighting for one day. “So the plan is to load Kennrick aboard the tender, then take it back to the rear of the train and load in the other four bodies?” I asked.
Bayta nodded. “Officially, they’ll be removing the bodies for direct transportation to their families. Along the way, though, they’ll stop at a siding and take some tissue samples and readings.”
“Sounds good,” I said. Between the Spiders’ readings, the samples Emikai and I had run though my analyzer the previous evening, and the data in Kennrick’s reader, the Spiders and Chahwyn ought to have everything they needed to plug this new loophole in their security net.
We passed through the vestibule at the end of the third compartment car and entered the first coach car, the one I’d cleared out as my operations base.
Only it wasn’t completely cleared out anymore. Osantra Qiddicoj, Krel Vevri, and Tra’ho Government Oathling Prapp, the three Modhran walkers, were standing silently a half-dozen steps in front of us, obviously waiting for us to make our appearance. Just behind them stood Asantra Muzzfor, the contract-team Filly who had been Kennrick’s staunchest supporter and apologist. “It’s over?” Muzzfor asked as Bayta and I stepped into the car. “He’s dead?”
“Yes, he’s dead,” I confirmed, taking another, closer look at the walkers. All three were standing unnaturally stiff, their eyes looking odd in a way I’d never seen in a walker before.
