by Pam Uphoff
“I’ll be running back and forth with Gennadiya’s stuff, and when you’re ready, I’ll bring Dimitri along with me.”
***
Three trips the next weekend. Curtains, decorative rugs—for the big lawn mower he rented a truck—bureaus, pictures to hang on the walls, shelves . . .
Two weeks later, he brought an apprehensive Dimitri along . . . It went well enough, with tears on both sides, Dimitri talking about his nightmares as a child, and the horrified realization in his early teens that the nightmare figure of Lord Vladimir was his father.
Sara returned to Vinogradov house, but the other women opted to stay longer “Because Dr. Solovsky needs help,” according to Sabina, and “Don’t interrupt me, I’m not done with this sweater,” from Agata, and Gennadiya’s “It’s her third, already and haven’t the benches arrived yet?”
“I’ll bring you some new patients as soon as everyone stops bothering me about everything else.” Axel promised.
Christmas came and went, and a new sort of normal set in. Money was tight, but even so the stress level was low without the looming Old Lord to placate.
Chapter Twenty-three
The Next Steps
Thursday, January 3, 3739
"We have to warn the President! He's in deep danger!"
Axel nodded to Lord Gunter von Colloredo. The German part of the Three Part Alliance was close and interpenetrated the Russian part. The Japanese part had explored in other directions and remained aloof.
"We checked for a legal path to Tier Two Stuttgart and have found blocks in all directions. The Council is debating whether, under the circumstances, a direct portal is an allowable emergency response."
The other German, Lord Hans von Mansfeld, winced. "Indeed. These days, opening an unauthorized portal could be seen as an attack." He snuck a look in the mirror, adjusted his wig carefully.
Gunter snorted. "Under these circumstances? All I need is time to phone the President and warn him that there may be imposters, including one of me! Then all will be forgiven."
Or used as an excuse to attack us. This is such a bad idea.
But he nodded as if he agreed. "I'll keep you updated. They ought to make a decision by tomorrow."
***
Then off for a duty cycle.
Murphy shook his head. “The Boss must be pissed at you. How long has it been since you’ve had Portal Guard Duty?”
“I think he’s trying to keep me busy so I can’t get into trouble on my own.”
“Hmm, can’t imagine why. Really.” Murphy stepped out to give the eye to the driver of a truck getting a bit too pushy for safe Portal transit. The truck slowed and the space between him and the truck ahead widened. Murph nodded and stepped back. “Not that a nice shred doesn’t liven up the day. Did I ever tell you about the time a chicken truck shredded?”
“Live chickens? I didn’t think we had any?”
“Oh, not here . . . that was . . . Tier Three Saarland. Man was I ever glad to see the last of that place.”
“I didn’t know you were from one of the German Worlds.”
“Oh, and you have me all analyzed?”
“You mean that very slight odd word usage when you’re in a hurry or really pissed, plus getting tangled up reading Cyrillic? I figured you grew up speaking English, and reading that barbaric alphabet.”
“Damn.” Murphy sounded indignant. “And it’s not barbaric. Cyrillic looks like it ought to make sense, unlike Japanese, where at least you know there’s no use even trying.” He crossed his arms and glowered.
“So? Barbequed German chickens?”
“Nah, the front of the truck took the brunt, and about three hundred chickens got blasted out the back. Half dead and half making a run for FREEDOM!”
“Don’t you mean flight?”
“Chickens can’t fly worth beans. And they’re both stupid and vicious.” Murphy grinned. “I was on punishment detail.”
“Now that does surprise me, you must have been very young and inexperienced to have gotten caught.”
“Actually if they’d realized the whole of it they’d have killed me. But that day, oh my, feathers and blood everywhere, and the live ones squawking and running around flapping . . . Took us hours! Actually that was an excellent last assignment there. We were all—a whole Cyborg Company—on the sales list. Me, separately on account of Leader type, the rest as ‘trained squads.’”
“A whole company?”
“The idiots tried to take a pretty high tech World and got handed their asses. Decided it was the fault of the troops’ lack of enthusiasm.”
Axel eyed him. “I don’t think I’m going to ask just how unenthusiastic you were.”
“I’m not sure I would tell even you.”
“Ooo! I always knew you had it in you to be bad. How long after that did you wind up here?”
“Two days. This damned red robe walked up and talked to me. I told him I didn’t kill civilians, and I didn’t raid worlds that had done nothing to deserve it.” A deep chuckle. “I might have been feeling a mite suicidal, back then.”
“Uh huh, and what did Inquisitor Gorbachev say to that?”
“He turned to the broker, signed his pad and said ‘I think you’ll fit right in. Come along.’ So I did. Might have had a bit of an attitude for a while.”
“A lot of the guys here are a bit that way.”
“But not you.”
“No, I saved that for dealing with Dear Uncle and the snobby cousins.” Axel sighed and pointed at a car as it rushed the portal and when it sped up, levitated the whole thing and pulled it out of line. “Let’s just see what this fellow’s trying to run.” He felt the gleeful satisfaction, from him and from the driver two trucks back. “And his pal.” He dropped the bait car in front of a wall, and reached to tangle the electronics of the truck.
The police joined them as the judge handed out search warrants. The driver of the car protested. The driver of the truck frowned at him. “What did you put in my truck?”
Under the legitimate load, six young men. Drugged, unconscious.
“Portal Clones, I recognize the look.” Axel shook his head. “This is going to get interesting, real soon.”
“So, they’re what, maybe sixteen or seventeen?” Ape shook his head. “Have they even been tested or rated yet?”
Zilla glowered. “Maybe privately, so someone knows what they’re worth?”
“Or they think that the Research Center’s gotten even better at cloning strong Portalmakers?” Piggy growled.
Yeah. Nothing like a good kidnapping to raise the ire of people already enslaved. And chipped. About the only thing worse than being Cyborged is getting wired into the Portal Controls.
Axel strolled over to the Cops. “So your hospital or ours?”
“All the Portal Clone kids belong to the Research Center, so your choice.”
“We’ll take them Up Top, then. Detox and see what’s going on.” Axel pulled out his phone and started tapping.
Alerted the medical staff and requested transport for six unconscious portal clone kids.
Dr. Borodin showed up with the ambulances and checked them. “Definitely Portal Clones. We’ll find out who they were fostered with and what’s going on.”
The two drivers were held on smuggling charges, pending investigation as to exactly how they happened to have acquired the clones.
Then his shift was over and he headed Up Top to doff the armor, shower and change.
He popped into the Medical Center; the clone kids were recovering from sedation, no problems expected. And wobbling in to frown at the slowly waking kids, Henrik Leitz, the Portalmaker he’d kidnapped. Bald head, six metal posts sticking out of his head.
“Nobody’s said what they’re going to do with me.” Henrik sighed. “I’ve talked with Dr. Borodin, he tried me in a helmet, didn’t work.”
Axel eyed him. “How would you like to try a different experiment?” He pulled out his phone and tapped in Dr. Borodin’s
number.
“Can I borrow Henrik?”
“I don’t think he’s mine to loan. You stole him, fair and square.”
Axel blinked. “True. Well . . . in that case, I’ll talk to the docs about springing him out of here. And why don’t you think about grabbing these six guys? A Mentalist training program and a bit of maturity and see if you can make a new Quad. Our two Portalmakers are pretty old.”
“Huh, with two more, I could do two Quads, but they need to work in shifts . . . I’ll look into a regular training program . . .”
***
He stopped by the Boss's office and got waved in by his secretary, a bright young man with his hair cut to display the one-by-one inch square of his executive plate on the right side of his skull.
"They're watching the Council debates."
"And cussing?"
"Growling and hissing, more often."
Axel tapped on the door and opened it without waiting for a reply. The two men barely glanced his direction, then focused back on the TV on the wall.
". . . we may need allies in the future, if we are attacked again."
"We have no way to pay . . . or even feed . . ."
"Which is why we need the goodwill of a large, prosperous Tier Two World, or more bluntly, we need them to owe us."
The Inquisitor had hung his red robes of office on a coat tree in the corner. He was slouched in the guest chair, one elbow on the desk and fingers tapping in irritation. "So what do you think we ought to do, Axel?"
"Find a Tier Five World directly outward of them and throw them through a portal to find their own way home."
They both grinned.
"Not that anyone's going to ask our opinions on the matter, but I've got to say I like that one." The Boss shrugged. "I just wish they were more cautious."
"They want to make sure we get credit for rescuing their very important people." The Inquisitor sighed. "What do you want to bet they want to send Team One through?"
The Boss shook his head. "Even they aren't that stupid. But they may want to send Igor to get them safely home."
Axel nodded. "Fortunately they didn't see me with brown hair, nor hear me called Igor. If they wish, I can glam up and go as myself."
His call sign in the Teams had garnered public notice a few times. Enough to get it used in some ridiculous movies. Fortunately he'd been careful to keep his real name a closely held secret, hence his dyed brown hair whenever he was up here. But after the unfortunate battles over last fall and early winter, more people were finding out, and it could easily go public.
And too many people know about my house too. Well . . . I invented a couple other secret identities years ago, to hide things from my dearly departed Evil Uncle. I can always go hide as one of them if I really need to. I should put a bit more depth into them.
Heck, I could publish that ridiculous book I wrote under one of them . . . that would be amusing, and hopefully I'll never need to admit to writing such utter trash.
"They'll be arguing for hours." The Boss shrugged. "Go home, Igor."
He nodded and slipped out.
Home. Such a divided meaning, these days. But since I've got the brown hair dye in, I'll start at the cliff house.
He dropped down to the ground floor and out the front door in time to catch the tram down to the city proper. It was a crisp winter day, perfect for a brisk two mile walk. And I need the exercise. I'm spending too much time doing everything else. Maybe I'll get up early and work out with the Team tomorrow morning.
He'd been spending a lot more time at the cliff house so there was actually food there, no need to stop and buy anything, today. He strode up the street, nothing suspicious in sight. A few older ladies giving him suspicious looks.
No sign of anyone home at his closest neighbor. The old houses had been, literally, built into the cliffs. Each individual and unique, the size of the houses determined by the width and depth of the niche they were built into, and the height of the cliff above. On his side, the garages were at street level and the house built up from there. Across the street, the street level garages were the top level, with the houses built into the next drop of the cliffs.
The neighbor's house was fairly small, three levels, three bedrooms. Just around a sharp jut of rock, his house was four levels and five bedrooms, plus tiny servants' quarters off the garage, and even a small yard, up on a ledge at third floor height.
He trotted up the steps, the security system receiving the signal from his watch, a facial recognition program double checking, the locks clicking open as he reached to push the door open.
To find a beautiful woman on the floor.
Surrounded by books, grinning.
"Hi Red! I mean Brown!"
"Hi, Dina. Found the boxes, I see."
"Well they did have my name on them." She looked around. "I don't know where to start."
He grinned. “It hardly matters. You’ll finish them all.”
I hope she stays happy! I think with the zivvy gone, she can just catch up on her education and adjust to . . . everything. She’s devouring increasingly complex books.
"I was going to drop them off for you yesterday evening but no one was home."
"Dad took me and Mom out for dinner. I'm, umm, still having a little trouble adulting." She grimaced. "I feel like I might almost have regained being eighteen. The thirty-year-old woman looking out at me from the mirror . . . is a bit daunting."
And very good looking! And looks younger than thirty, for that matter.
"Ah, but is she hungry and do I have anything to feed her?" He walked past her and into the kitchen. "A sandwich so you can keep reading?" All my college books, hauled out of storage. Pleasure reading and text books.
She picked a book and edged up to the table. "Aren't you afraid I'll ruin something?"
"Nope. I haven't the faint idea how it could possibly have happened, but you will probably find quite a few food stains already there."
He threw together two sandwiches, cut them into quarters, "Easier to eat and read," and popped sodas, and spotted an old favorite and settled down to read and eat.
Stopping only when her parents showed up and he fed them too. For the sheer pleasure of enjoying eating with nice people. And keeping my libido in check. Because I don't know who she'll be when she finishes catching up with herself.
And . . . dear god, when, if, she gets back to normal, what will she think of me? She may have started it, but then I willingly used her as an experimental subject.
They occasionally eyed his brown-dyed hair, but only asked how his other house repairs were going.
"Slowly. I . . . have an appointment with the historical society in a few hours. It should be interesting."
Mitty snickered, and helped cart the boxes of books back to their house.
***
A shower to get the brown dye out of his red hair, different suit . . . and he still walked down a few blocks to a strip of stores to call a cab.
My family isn't as bad as it used to be, but that doesn't mean I want them to know where I disappear to on occasion.
***
A few repairs were underway, when he got there. A glazier with experience in antique methods was replacing the last of the broken panes in the front entry. Some beveled, some etched. Beautiful creations, over three hundred years old. The representatives of the historical society were frowning at the poor man, but quickly transferred their glares to Axel.
"He's taking glass from the damaged back windows!" Lord Vasily Chaban was the head of the society.
Axel nodded. "Yes. I want all original glass in the Grand Hall. You all know the building's construction, right? Both sides are basically built of a twelve by twelve by twelve three dimensional grid of steel I beams, with panels inset where desired. The Grand Hallway is wide open but the front and back walls are twelve by twelve panels, again."
Waved them all toward the back, leading the way. "So the back wall is a five-by-four set of panels. Nineteen window
panels, and the bottom center, a door with flanking windows and transom.
"So to have original glass, we will be taking out the five bottom panels. The window panels we'll replace with four panels from the third floor back wall. The door panel we'll replace with the identical panel from the end of the west wing. We'll put in temporary window and door panels there, while these panels are being repaired, and the glass replaced. When we get them back, we'll swap them for the temporary windows and doors."
The head of the society glowered at him. "Rumor has it that the Trust's Insurance is insufficient."
"Umm, it has a very high deductible—one million rubles—the endowment could cover that easily, but the Family will be covering most of it. The Trust's investments bring in enough to cover expenses, and not much more. I am trying to not eat into the principal as that can develop into a nasty downward spiral."
Half of the dozen men were eyeing him dubiously, the rest were looking around in dismay.
A grey haired man shook his head. "This incredible paneling! There must be hundreds of bullet holes!"
"Imported hardwoods. Beautiful, aren't they?" Axel walked over to an especially badly splintered area. Lowering his shields, drawing in power. Applying mental force to first pull the bullets that were imbedded in the paneling free, then feeling the fibers of the wood and teasing them gently back into place, with a bit of hands-on pressure. He stepped back, eyed the grain of the wood and worked the fibers again, lining them up carefully.
"My maternal grandfather, Dr. Ingolf von Richter, researched material sciences and mental manipulations extensively. Repairing all the paneling will take some time, as the process is energy intensive." He eyed the wide-eyed boggling group. "I don't suppose any of you have any experience in . . . no? Well. It will probably take the better part of a year to get everything. But it will be done."
A younger-looking man snorted. "You should just pay someone! Not dirty your hands. But then you are . . ."
