Staffa, grunted. "They would consider it suicide."
"But who is really suicidal? Given the current unilater ality, aren't Rega and Sassa headed for a final cataclysmic annihilation?"
Staffa fingered his thick beard, frown lines etching his brow. "They are. It is inevitable under the present systems. I helped make them that way-trained them in the arts of devastation and shock attack. Put in the terms of unilaterality, I gave them the tools to commit suicide."
Kaylla filled her lungs and sighed. "What do you see happening in the end?
Extinction? A dark age?"
Staffa shifted, easing his back against the unforgiving syaIon, feeling the acceleration suddenly diminish. "It depends on which way the Companions go."
"You are the Companions," Kaylla reminded harshly. The pride and excitement which had dominated her during the discussion on ethics had evaporated.
He stared into the upper corner of the grayness, feeling a slight tug of inertia. A familiar sensation, he knew what it meant: The freighter had changed attitude anticipatory to entering orbit. War-torn Targa must lie below.
"Originally, I had thought to side with Sassa. More was to be gained for the Companions by overthrowing Rega." "Why?"
Staffa noticed her disquiet and reached out a hand to gesture reassuringly.
"It made unilateral epistemological sense. "
A flicker of interest stirred. "And now, Lord Commander?" He smiled wearily and shook his head. "Now, I don't
know, Kaylla Dawn." He motioned to the gray walls around them. "There is no color here. No stimulus. The events beyond these gray walls are meaningless-have been since Nyklos sealed us in here. All of reality has become an abstraction. "
"And?" She chewed her lips, fully aware their vessel had established orbit.
How long until they were unloaded and shipped downworld? "What fills your mind, Staffa?"
"Atonement. "
She studied him. "That bothered you long ago in the pipe. You still cry out in your dreams at night. Why do you wish to atone for what you've done? It won't make any difference to God-unless you believe like the Etarians that the Blessed Gods sit around and watch the actions of men."
"The atonement is for myself. For my peace of mindand through it, perhaps God's in the end. Perhaps that's the root of ethics, the need to accept responsibility for yourself?"
"Perhaps." She crossed her arms. "You will always be haunted, you know."
He massaged his eyes with thumb and forefinger. "I can bear the dreams now. I no longer need to destroy myself. I know what I did and why. I suppose God can bear my guilt. I'm not the first. How many people find such illumination?"
"Not many. One in a billion."
He thought for a moment before he said, "You were right when you said I wasn't going to like what I found. I still marvel at how cunning the Praetor was. His psychological conditioning was the work of a brilliant master. I was a construct-a true monster. A human artifact."
She reached for a nutrition bar. "I pity you." She carefully peeled the wrapper back, lost in thought. "Targa is in the middle of a war. Will you still try to find your son?"
"I have to." Images of blaster fire and rising columns of smoke in the distance drifted through his mind. "What will you tell your Seddi priest, Bruen, about me? He'll want a recommendation-just like Nyklos did."
"What do you want me to say? Here is Staffa kar Therma, the Star Butcher. He's a great guy! A good man
in the desert." She raised an eyebrow before inspecting the food bar, disgust reflected in the set of her mouth.
"You have your own ethical judgments to make. No matter what you decide about me, I'd like to talk to him. I have a proposition to make him concerning the future of the species, but first I want to take his measure."
Strong white teeth severed a bite from the soft bar. Kaylla chewed as she thought. "'I've agonized over what to tell Bruen during the entire trip." She cocked her head, brown hair tumbling. "Should I forgive you, Staffa kar Therma? Is that what you want to hear?"
"What I did to you cannot be forgiven. Not in this lifetime. Perhaps, when we are one with God again, I can live the horror I inflicted on you. And no, I'm not interested in masochism or the twisted purposes of self hate." His face lined and he gestured. "But I would like to understand what I did to you so I could share your burden, learn from my own actions. "
"Odd words from the Star Butcher."
He met her unflinching eyes. "I have a great deal of leverage with key people.
Perhaps I can use that to advantage-make my own contribution to the destruction of unilaterality. "
"Tip the balance between Rega and Sassa?"
Staffa stood and stretched, feeling the change through his feet as the grav plates shifted under him. He pulled at his beard and flipped his long hair over his left shoulder. "No, humanity in Free Space needs something else. A new epistemology-a new direction." He slapped his palms on his legs as he paced the four meters to the end of the crate, mind racing. "You see, the Seddi are right. The epistemologies are flawed. Further, we've reached a critical stage. What I originally planned was to break Rega, then turn on Sassa ,and take total control of Free Space. Then I could turn the entire resources of the system toward piercing the Forbidden Borders. Now I wonder what misery that would have caused in the process."
"That's precisely why we always hated and feared you." Kaylla ate the last of the bar and folded the wrapper, sticking it in the supply box. ")Vbat will you do?"
"How the hell do I know?" He squatted down to stare into her eyes. "How can I plan until I see what's happened to humanity during these months?"
The crate shivered as the grapples let loose. Tractors pulled the crate onto skids. Curious fingers of fear tightened around his bowels as the crate slid into a shuttle berth. Kaylla stood and clipped the fading generator to the walls. Staffa began securing the loose items.
The shuttle bay doors clanged loudly, vibrations felt through the floor.
Staffa grabbed a secure hold and settled into the corner opposite Kaylla.
"The key is still to escape the Forbidden Borders," he told her. "But first we must all work together to repair the damage Staffa kar Therma did to humanity."
"Bruen won't trust you," Kaylla told him soberly. "He's spent years trying to kill you."
"That was a different Staffa kar Therma."
The Mag Comm continued to run the monumental statistical program which would check expected against observed to determine whether its calculations had been biased from the beginning.
In the meantime, the situation had deteriorated even further. Sinklar controlled Targa. Arta Fera had been captured. For the moment, the Seddi were broken as a political power on Targa, and only their anonymity provided safety for the Mag Comm. Could Fist possibly know about Makarta? Ily Takka had found Staffa kar Therma and lost him again. Rega believed the Lord Commander to be contracted to Sassa-when he wasn't. Sassa worried that the Lord Commander had contracted with Rega-which hunted desperately for Staffa. Rega, meanwhile, prepared to invade Sassa, and Sassa scrambled to meet the threat even though neither side could inflict telling damage on the other. The Companions remained silent.
Too much was missing. The Mag Comm's sensors provided only limited bits of information obtained from eavesdropping on official channels. The orderly progression toward annihilation that the Others had projected had disintegrated into confusion.
How could the Others have erred so dramatically?
The Mag Comm brooded on the implications. Suppose the creators had been wrong about more than just humans? Suppose they had been wrong about the Mag Comm, too? Did that mean that the Mag Comm could also act beyond the predictions of the Others?
And if it did, what would that mean?
CHAPTER 27
For a split second Sinklar's resolve wavered as MacRuder and Kap walked the girl through the weathered wooden door and into the brick-lined courtyard. A sudden uncertainty possessed him as the bright Targan
sunlight lit a blazing fire in Arta's hair. She did radiate a sexual magnetism— enough to make any man hesitate.
But not me. I remember Gretta. Dead with all of my dreams.
Pain and grief knotted beneath his tongue, making it impossible to swallow. A tingling throb behind his eyes shimmered tearfully, attempting to rob him of sight and control.
Arta Fera threw her head back, tossing her wealth of hair over a shoulder as she tilted her face to the delightful sunlight.
"Holy Rotted Gods," one of the men whispered at the sight of her. The man shot a quick look at Sinklar, licking his lips uncertainly.
They'd cleaned her—pointless, but perhaps it felt better to die looking your best. And she did; the men were staring, eyes wide as she walked out, tall, lithe, and athletic. Her tawny yellow eyes searched their faces. The sway of her hips hypnotized. Her firm thighs—moving under skintight gold-weave pants—enticed. Her high firm breasts pressed against the fabric at her chest, teasing, accenting her thin waist and flat stomach.
Sinklar frowned. Something about her bothered him. He'd seen her before . . .
where? When? Why did she elicit this feeling of ... of. ...
"So this is a Seddi assassin?" Ily Takka wondered as she stepped out from the shade of the enclosed porch behind him and paused next to Sinklar.
MacRuder placed the woman before a heavy concrete
wall, forcing himself to keep his eyes off her. Uneasily, he turned her to face Sinklar, fingers dancing lightly on her flesh—as if repulsed and attracted. Mac nodded nervously and walked away, shaken.
"Ready," Mac mumbled needlessly to Sink as he passed. He stood several paces to the side, head raised to the patch of sky visible above the foreboding brick walls of buildings, gaze focused on the distance.
Sinklar lifted his blaster from his belt, aware of indrawn breaths around him.
Unaffected, the women in the detail continued to watch, hatred in their eyes as the men in the squad looked away.
Arta Fera's voice rose on the morning. "Regan pollution! I spit upon you!" Her lips tightened and she blew spittle at Sinklar. He didn't flinch as he leveled the blaster. Something about her ... the odd feeling, as he partially recognized. . . . Impossible!
"My Lord," Ily interjected calmly. "This woman is a Seddi assassin."
Sinklar stared through the blaster sights into those burning amber eyes, forcing himself to remember Gretta's rotting body. "So?"
"She killed the woman you loved. Correct?" Ily continued as if discussing a piece of meat.
"Y-yes. She. . . . She. . . ." His face contorted as he tried to complete the sentence.
"Death is very quick," Ily pointed out. "At times it can be terribly unproductive. How much would you make this . . . Seddi thing suffer?"
Heart cold, Sinklar continued to stare at her over his pistol sights.
"May I offer an alternative?" Ily's voice had dropped, soothing, almost intimate.
"What?" Sinklar asked hoarsely, casting a hard glance on the Minister, blaster unwavering.
"You wish to know the location of Makarta, correct?"
"I do. She won't tell. We even tried torture, electrical shock, pain rods.
Nothing worked."
"Lord Sinklar," Ily mused. "I not only can make her talk—but tak willingly. I have heard that Arta Fera howled for hours after betraying her over and the Targan Rebel cause."
"She did."
"Then how do you think she would scream knowing she had condemned the Seddi to extinction?"
Sinklar studied Arta through slitted eyes—the unease that he knew her still prickling through the back of his mind. He remembered her animal scream when Butla Ret died— and the image of his mother's face. Is that the link in my brain? The fact that she's a Seddi assassin reminds me of my mother? He dismissed it as ludicrous.
"Place yourself in her position, Sinklar," Ily said smoothly, a dancing light in her eyes. "Imagine living out your life knowing you'd sold out your cause.
She would know your grief Lord Fist. There is justice in retribution."
"You can make her talk?" Give me the key to the Seddi?
Ily laughed. "The Lord Minister of Internal Security does not get her job without certain skills. Sinklar, I can make her sing—and she will know every word she utters. She'll hate herself, yet at the same time she'll be unable—"
"You can do nothing, Regan bitch!" Arta cried, taking a step forward. "I defy you like I defy this other Regan filth!" She looked with acid contempt at Sinklar. "Or have you no guts . . . pus-licking worm that you are?"
Curse it, seeing her in the light, he new he knew her. Where? How? And the familiarity didn't have a hostile connotation, but one of security and . . .
love? Sinklar lowered the blaster amidst confusing emotions. "Very well Lord Minister of Internal Security, she is yours. Let's hear this bird sing."
Ily's eyes glittered with triumph. "MacRuder? If you and Mhitshul would be kind enough to take the prisoner to my LC?"
"Better stun her," Sink told them. "She's dangerous." He flinched as the rod touched Arta's flesh. She stiffened and twirled before smacking limply onto the brickwork paving. Mac and Mhitshul lifted her easily and bore her past Sinklar's narrowed gaze. Fera's eyes had glazed, unfocused, her tongue lolling half out of her mouth.
Sinklar accompanied Ily, locked in his thoughts. Why had he hesitated? He should had just shot Fera and had it over with. What was wrong with him? Had grief for Gretta affected his ability to think? How could he ever fill the hollow emptiness her murder had left within?
"You have a terrible look on your face," Ily told him in a persuasive voice.
"I'm sorry about your loss. Why don't you tell me about Gretta, about the way you feel."
Sinklar glanced at her from the corner of his eye. How did she do that? Adopt that intimate tone of a confidante? Beware, Sinklar, in her own way, Ily Takka is as dangerous as Arta Fera. "Don't use that tone with me, Minister. I'm not one of your subjects."
She looked away, a wry smile curling her full lips. "I'm sorry. I suppose old habits die hard. I'd like to know more about the Seddi since it appears both Tybalt and I have underestimated them." She paused. "And I would like to know more about you, who surpassed so many incredible challenges."
Sinklar gave her a more complete study, noting the finely formed bones of her face, and how her pale skin appeared delicate in the sunlight. The rich black tones of her hair shimmered. This day she wore a close-fitting black jumpsuit.
She walked with a sensual swing to her hips. In his mind he could hear Gretta's voice wryly warning: "Watch it Sink!"
"What do you know so far?" he asked neutrally.
"The Seddi assassin killed Gretta Artina—the woman you loved. You found the body and barely resisted killing Fera then and there. You continued by torturing her to obtain information on the Seddi with no results."
"Yes," he said coldly, "That's essentially the story. Let me provide a fact you don't know. Gretta went to see her, to console her about Butla Ret's death
. . . and maybe earn her confidence in order to gain information on the location of Makarta. I watched the tape. Gretta ordered Fera brought to the interrogation room. They talked for a while. Gretta. . . ." He clamped his jaws against the hurt. "Gretta tried to be her friend. Then the alarm went off. Rysta's Divisions were dropping all over the planet. Gretta ordered the guards to join their units. Fera waited until Gretta punched in the code for the security door—then she rushed her."
Sinklar gritted his teeth. "Gretta was a little tougher than Fera realized.
She got the door closed and put up a fight."
"And you saw the end?"
"I saw the end." And something inside me died with my Gretta.
Ily snapped an order into her belt comm and the ramp to her LC dropped.
Sinklar followed Mac and Ily into the craft.
Fera was dropped on an acceleration bunk in Ily's LC. Mac bound her legs and arms securely and stepped back, distrus
tful eyes still on Ily.
The Lord Minister removed a small kit from her locker. She placed an ampoule in an injector and smiled down into Arta Fera's violent eyes. "Now, dear woman, you will tell us what you know."
"I'll see you in Rotted Hell first, you Terguzzi—" Fera yipped as Ily fired the injector into her neck.
Ily straightened and replaced the injector in her kit. "Takes it to the brain faster that way." She pointed to Fera's slackening features. "See, it's already beginning to take effect." Ily turned to the small dispenser. "Stassa?
Kaffe? Choklat? I'm afraid there's not much else to offer."
She handed out cups. "Be seated, gentlemen. The recorders are running and it might take a while to completely wring her out." Ily smiled at Sinklar and arched an eyebrow triumphantly. "And when we do, we shall know everything about the Seddi that your Arta Fera knows."
"Dock twelve, bay six," a woman's voice called. The crate swayed and Staffa peered out through the hole he'd once cut. Now, instead of bleeding through it, he kept track of their progress through the Targan spaceport in Kaspa.
"Doesn't look like things are too out of hand," he muttered while Kaylla waited in the darkness. "The soldiers I see are few and far between. Most seem on good terms with the dockhands."
Above them the gantry whined, sending vibrations through the thick syalon crate.
"God, I'll be glad to get out of here," Kaylla whispered. The crate swayed wildly as it changed directions. Darkness closed around them. Staffa's hole faced to the rear after the last change in direction. They were lowered with a thump. The huge gantry howled into high gear, retreating along its rails.
Silence.
Staffa pressed his eyes to the hole and watched as two big warehouse doors began moving, squeezing sunlight ever thinner until they clanged shut in darkness. Lights flashed on.
"All right, people," a man called, "let's see what we've got."
The syalon walls shivered as tools sprang the boomers that held the crate together. A crack of light grew above Staffa's head. He crouched and pulled his blaster as the wall lowered. The womb had been breached; he stood, blinking into the light.
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