The Champion

by Scott Sigler

  “Oh, you do remember,” Procknow said. “Then maybe the question isn’t why Mike was in the ZG. Maybe the question is why you’re not. You don’t give a damn about your people, do you, champ?”

  Procknow spoke with conviction and energy, but something about it rang hollow; not false, exactly, but maybe not true enough.

  “My people never gave a damn about me,” Quentin shot back. “Because I was an orphan, as you just pointed out.”

  “Bats kill orphans just like they kill everyone else,” Procknow said. “More of them, even. Orphan or confirmed, it doesn’t really matter — the bats kill our people like they kill people everywhere they go.”

  Kimberlin stood up again, slowly this time. “That’s enough, Jason. Look, Quentin, Zak and I were in the ZG. Yes, we facilitated violent acts, but we attacked Creterakians. I never attacked anything myself, I was just a go-between, shuttling information or other resources from one cell to another. Yitzhak recruited me while I was still in Tier Three. It paid well then, that’s how he brought me in, but I quickly saw the bigger picture, the importance of true independence. The Guild was always hoping to snag someone early in hopes the player would make it to Tier One and get full diplomatic immunity. With me, that strategy worked.”

  Quentin remembered being bound hand and foot to a metal X, the bats asking him if he had involvement with the Zoroastrian Guild.

  “The league caught on to that,” he said. “They gave me a lie detector at the Combine.”

  Procknow raised his hand. “Same here. Easy test to beat, though, unless you have the pain tolerance of a five-year-old.”

  Quentin ignored him.

  “Don’t tell me you only attacked bats, Mike,” he said. “I watch the damn news. I’ve seen years of attacks on civilians. The Guild is a bunch of murderers.”

  Which is exactly what the Creterakians are ... so why is one better than the other?

  Kimberlin shook his head. “Not when Zak ran it. The Guild changed, Quentin. New people came in, took over. Things got bad.”

  The words danced in Quentin’s head.

  “Wait a minute ... did you say when Zak ran it? Yitzhak Goldman was the leader of the Zoroastrian Guild?”

  “A big chunk of it, yes,” Kimberlin said. “But like I told you, it changed. When Zak was in charge, we targeted only Creterakian military installations. Garrisons, barracks, troop ships, that sort of thing.” He stared at the floor. As he spoke, his words gradually became fainter and fainter. “Then new blood started coming in, around early 2675. By ’76, things got bad. The new guys weren’t patriots or nationalists, they were thugs. Thugs with money to buy loyalty. They started pushing to add sympathizers to the list of targets.”

  “Sympathizers? What do you mean?”

  “Like the holy men,” Procknow said. “Scumbags who win favor with the Creterakians by helping them.”

  For that, at least, Quentin shared some of Procknow’s anger. Church leaders had embraced the Creterakians, used the bats to eliminate rivals. Sometimes holy men curried favor with local garrisons by publicly telling people to do whatever the Creterakians asked. Some religious leaders even went so far as to say the bats were a tool of High One himself, and that Creterakian orders should be followed without question. Those people were traitors, Quentin knew ... but to murder them for it?

  “It started with sympathizers, but the new blood quickly ramped up their rhetoric,” Kimberlin said. “They claimed any target — including civilians — was justified as long as the attack damaged the Creterakian Empire. Zak tried to push back, tried to keep operations limited to military targets. The new blood then accused Zak of being a sympathizer, said that’s why he wanted to keep the attacks small. The two conflicting schools of thought turned into a genuine schism.”

  “What’s a schism?”

  “A split,” Procknow said. “Like when we were little kids and that group on Mason became the Purist Orthodox Church, and Butcher Smith ordered them all dead. Remember?”

  Quentin did. For much of his life, he’d thought that maybe his parents had fled because of Smith’s pogrom.

  “So now instead of one group killing random people, you had two,” Quentin said. “Awesome.”

  Kimberlin shook his head. “No ... we killed each other.”

  His voice was a husk, a dry leaf blowing on frozen ground. It held anguish, a deep pain that stabbed at the soul. Quentin’s anger and frustration receded, tidal waves frozen just before the crash.

  “That guy you killed,” Quentin said. “The one you won’t talk about. It was because of this schism?”

  Kimberlin nodded. “It was in a warehouse in Red Storm City. We were having a meeting to iron out the differences between the old guard, which I was a part of, and the new guys. One of the new guys, Farmar Lwazi, his name was, a backup rookie tight end for the Jacks ... he brought a gun. He started shooting. I took a bullet in the arm, but I got to him. I ...” Mike looked at his own hands, massive things as big as Quentin’s head, flexed them in and out, in and out.

  “I hit him. I hit him so many times. I’m not sure which punch killed him, but I think it was one of the early ones.”

  Procknow let out a long whistle. “Damn, Mike — that’s hardcore.”

  Kimberlin moved his jaw side to side, gave his whole body a shake.

  “Anyway, that’s what told me it was time to get out. They’ll kill me if an easy opportunity comes up, but I’m not that important and they won’t go out of their way to get me. Zak, though, that’s different. That device that beeped in his pocket? That let him talk to various cells. That’s why he kept it for so long. Zak had informers in areas of the Guild, and if he caught wind of an attack on civilians, he’d try to send out a counter message. The new blood runs the Guild now, Quentin, and they wanted Zak gone, wanted it bad.”

  Quentin felt a sinking sensation.

  “The parade bombing,” he said. “Zak was sitting in the same car I was. They were trying to kill him, not me.”

  Kimberlin nodded. “Same thing with that fighter attack on the Touchback. They wanted Zak gone.”

  “And now he is,” Procknow said. “Thanks to you, Barnes.”

  Something about Procknow held Quentin’s focus. Not him, exactly, but rather the dates involved.

  “I’m only two years older than you, Jason,” Quentin said. “So in seventy-six, when Mike left, you were ... what, ten years old?”

  Procknow said nothing. He just stared back.

  “Mike, explain that,” Quentin said. “How can Procknow be a former member if he was ten when you and Zak got out?”

  “He wasn’t in it then, obviously,” Kimberlin said. “The new blood recruited him as a paid courier, just like they did with me. Zak still has contacts in the ZG. Someone tipped him off about Jason. Zak talked to Jason about the big picture, and now Jason works with us.”

  “Paid courier?” Quentin said. “So much for all that talk about rising up against the occupiers.”

  “I have a family,” Procknow said. “I have to provide for them. I can be patriotic and still get paid for it. I make league minimum, Barnes, not millions like you.”

  So much emphasis and intensity on the word minimum. Maybe Procknow’s words rang hollow when he spoke of fighting the Creterakians, but not when he spoke about his family, and not when he spoke about money.

  “So why didn’t they just pay you to kill Zak, Jason? You could get to him anytime, right?”

  “Because I’m not a killer,” Procknow said. “Especially not for a guy like Zak, who is trying to fight back.”

  “And they wouldn’t ask him to do that,” Kimberlin said. “A Tier One player is probably the most valuable asset they can have. Either side, old blood or new, they wouldn’t ask an active player to do anything that might get them kicked off a team or out of the league.”

  So Kimberlin was “old blood.” And Jason was, what... both? At any rate, neither of them were to be trusted.

  “I still don’t understand the change,
” Quentin said. “You said the schism happened within a year or so of the new blood coming in. If Zak was the leader of the Guild, how did he lose control so fast?”

  “Money,” Kimberlin said, as if that word explained all of the universe’s unanswered questions. “The Guild always had a decent amount of money — donations from sentients who hated Creterakian rule, mostly — but the new blood? The money they threw around ... it changed everything. So much, and in untraceable formats.”

  Quentin felt a sudden chill 111 his chest.

  “Untraceable,” he said. “What do you mean, untraceable.”

  “Gems, mostly,” Kimberlin said. “And precious metals. Highly valuable material that could be used anywhere in the galaxy to buy arms or equipment, or to bribe officials.”

  Quentin felt weak, almost boneless, like he was cold, dead meat barely above the freezing point. His legs started to give out. He managed to turn so that he fell into his favorite chair — the sudden drop made one of the chair legs snap, left him sitting at an angle.

  “Q,” Kimberlin said, “are you all right?”

  Quentin heard but didn’t hear.

  “High One,” he whispered. “It can’t be.”

  Kimberlin leaned forward. “What is it, Q? Tell me.”

  Quentin blinked a few times. The room seemed to dematerialize around him.

  “Petra,” he said. “She came to me again, Mike. Through Bumberpuff, I mean. She said that the Abernessia had advance agents in our galaxy. They tried to buy off Prawatt with ... with precious metals, and gems.”

  Kimberlin stared. Then he, too, sat heavily, the couch groaning under his weight.

  “Jesus,” he said. “The Abernessia.”

  Mike didn’t need to be told all the particulars. The look on his face made it clear: he’d put the pieces together and didn’t like the end result.

  Procknow looked from one to the other. “Petra? You mean Petra Prawatt? Are you kidding me? And what the hell is an Abernessia?”

  Quentin shook his head. He had to focus on one thing at a time. “Never mind, it doesn’t matter right now. Look, this is a lot for me to process. It’s all ... it’s way more complicated than I thought.”

  It had seemed so cut and dried, but it wasn’t. The new Guild was bad. Did that mean the old Guild was better, because they fought against the new Guild? Was Zak actually a good guy in all this? Could someone who blew up buildings and ships even be a good guy?

  All of a sudden right and wrong weren’t quite so cut and dried. Quentin felt drained. He was done with all of it and just wanted to think about something else.

  “You both need to leave,” he said.

  Neither man did. They both stared at him, waiting for more.

  “Oh, right,” Quentin said. “I’m not telling anyone about this. Froese squashed the story. No one is going to know about Yitzhak’s involvement in the Bord uprising, whatever that might have been. I’m not a cop and I’m not a soldier — If you both promise me it’s over, that you will never, ever communicate with the Guild again, I’ll let all this go. I can’t have your involvement screwing up our season. Give me your word, and we never have to talk about it again.”

  Kimberlin glanced at Procknow. It was the look of an older man silently giving guidance to a younger one, Kimberlin urging Jason to accept the deal.

  Procknow sighed and shook his head. “Yeah, okay,” he said. “Wasn’t as if I was all that involved anyway. That whole schism thing happened when I was like nine years old. I’d rather just play football.”

  Kimberlin looked at Quentin, his face earnest. “I promise, Q. I’m done with all of it.”

  Quentin pointed to the door. “Then both of you get out of here. I just don’t want to deal with this anymore.”

  The two linemen left. Quentin stared at his holotank for a little while. It was off, showing nothing but blank gray.

  He wondered if Becca had already shuttled down. He wanted her there with him, needed her, but things were broken between them. Since their talk at D’Oni, she’d avoided him completely.

  Maybe he would call her. Later, though, because he realized there was someone on board who probably needed a friend far more than he did.

  THE REST OF THE TEAM had shuttled down to Ionath hours ago. Quentin didn’t feel like leaving, not just yet. Too much to process. He just wanted to stay on the Touchback for a while, have a couple of beers. And besides, he had company — someone who felt the same way he did.

  Yolanda was sprawled out on Quentin’s couch, a portrait of defeat. Her right hand covered her face as if it were a shield that might hide her from the galaxy. Her left hand held a mag can of Miller Lager.

  Quentin wondered if that was how he had looked shortly after the ’84 playoffs, when he’d thought he was on his way to a Galaxy Bowl title but lost in the opening round against the Wabash Wolfpack.

  Quentin had never written a story, never been interested in being a journalist, and really had no idea what went into Yolanda’s job. Nor did he have any idea of how writers defined “success.” There were awards, probably, and popularity, but nothing as straightforward as a tournament bracket resulting in a clear-cut winner.

  What he could relate to, though, was seeing years of work vanish in an instant.

  “Yolanda, you want another?”

  “I’m not some booze-swilling jock, Barnes,” she said into her hand. “A second beer isn’t going to help my mood.”

  “Maybe not, but it sure isn’t going to hurt it.”

  Her hand slid down a little. She looked at him guardedly. “Okay,” she said. “One more. Thanks.”

  He walked to his tiny kitchen and came back with two more mag cans. He handed her one, then sat back down in his favorite chair — the leg was still broken, and he still sat at an angle. He would have to have Messal get that fixed.

  They opened their cans at the same time, with a hiss of in-rushing air and the crackle of sudden frost.

  Yolanda sat up and took a sip.

  “That little scumbag,” she said.

  “You mean Froese or Whykor?”

  “Take your pick. They both screwed me over. You know what that story would have done for my career?”

  He was having a hard time thinking his own career was all that important, let alone hers. Sandoval, Zak, the Guild, Kimberlin and Procknow’s involvement in what Zak had or hadn’t done, and — worst of all — seeing Petra’s claims of Abernessia corruption all but confirmed by Kimberlin. The future invaders were using the Guild to drive wedges between governments and races alike.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe there are some things more important than a news story, don’t you think?”

  She paused mid-sip, lowered her can.

  “Okay, I guess that’s fair,” she said. “Whatever this does to the ZG, at least Goldman isn’t using the GFL to help kill sentients.”

  Quentin raised his beer. “And that’s due to your work. Cheers.”

  She hesitated, then raised her own. “Cheers.”

  Yolanda was relaxing a little. That was good. She’d busted her butt on that story, and he had no end of respect for that. Still, if Kimberlin was telling the truth, Zak had been trying to stop attacks, not start them. Did that excuse what he’d done in the past? No, not really, but it made things damn complicated. The older Quentin got, it seemed, the more he learned that there were no easy answers, that black and white were thin strips bordering a wide swath of gray.

  The football field had rules. Life did not.

  “I wonder what will happen with Zak,” he said.

  Yolanda shrugged. “I don’t know. Bad things happen on the Regulator. I can’t prove that, though. Froese has that ship locked up right.”

  She took another sip, sagged deeper into the couch.

  “I worked so hard on this,” she said. “Now I’ve got nothing.”

  Quentin nodded, wishing he could help her in some way. When he lost a game, the only thing that made him feel better was winning the next one.
She’d lost a major story; to get over it, he imagined she needed a new one that was just as big.

  Could he tell her about the schism in the Zoroastrian Guild? In-fighting among that group would not only make a great story, it might be an early alert to what the Abernessia were doing. But if told her about that, he would reveal that he knew more about the ZG than he’d let on.

  He wished he could tell her about Jonathan Sandoval’s blackmail, about the reporter’s double-life as a CMR spy. What a story that would be, probably as big as the ZG schism. Quentin took a long pull at his beer. As long as Sandoval was threatening to tell the CMR the actual size of the CoQB, then Quentin couldn’t ...

  ... Sandoval ...

  ... the CMR ...

  ... schism ...

  “Barnes!”

  Her shout and a sensation of cold wetness spreading across his chest snapped him out of it. He’d spilled beer all down his chin and onto his shirt. He stood up, first thinking he had to grab a towel, then forgetting about it in the same instant.

  It will work ... it will work!

  “An exclusive,” he said. “For you, the story, an exclusive on Jona ...” he barely caught himself from saying the full name.

  “On John Tweedy?”

  “No, forget that part,” he said. “But an exclusive for you and it’s about sports and ... I ... and ...”

  He was stammering, sloshing beer onto the floor. That was no way for a calculating leader to act. He took a deep breath, controlled his emotions and embraced the calm.

  “I have a story for you,” he said. “About me, sort of, to replace the one Froese took.”

  She shook her head. “My coverage of you on this trip didn’t produce any news. I hate to tell you, but other than your quirky habit of throwing up all the time? All you do is focus on football. No disrespect intended, Barnes, but you’re kind of boring.”

  “Not that,” he said. “Something else, something really big. I need to get you some information, and I need to do it now. So I’m sorry, but—” he gestured to the door with his beer hand, inadvertently spilling a little more “—do you mind taking the shuttle down yourself?”