Agent X

by Morgan Blayde

  He answered sub-vocally. “This place takes its security seriously. Check the security sub-routines. See if the rest of the furnishings have hidden functions we should know about.”

  “I’m on it.”

  Bentley and Dobson hung back, off to the side, trying in vain to be inconspicuous.

  Chim and Elissa sat down on the lizard-leather sectional, across from the owner. She stared speculatively through lowered lashes, crossing her legs and waving for a waiter. He hurried over with a tall fluted glass, apparently knowing exactly what she drank. The waiter turned toward Chim. “Can I get something for you and the lady?”

  “A ginger ale for me and a Vegan Starburst for the lady,” Chim said.

  The waiter bowed and scurried away.

  Chim turned to the owner. “Do you have a name you want to share with us?”

  She thought about it a few seconds and answered, “Rhianna Collins. Does that mean anything to you?”

  Elissa went still. Chim knew she was tapping the ship’s computer memory, cross-referencing vid-news files. After a moment, she spoke. “Rhianna Collins, only child of billionaire industrialist Samuel Frances Collins. You’re listed as a personal assistant to your father who’s a majority stockholder in a dozen sector corporations, and you run numerous charitable foundations. Current gossip links you to a series of tempestuous affairs as well as numerous scandals involving—”

  “Apparently,” Rhianna interrupted, “you are very well informed, not that I doubted it. Tandem is not a game for the intellectually feeble or the unprepared.” She rose, leaning forward to proudly display her cleavage, and glided around the table to take up a closer position by Elissa. “Care to tell me why Imperial Security’s suddenly interested in my … um …

  affairs?”

  Her personal space invaded, Elissa shot Chim a troubled glance while sub-vocalizing. “If she starts to get naked, I’m outta here.”

  He spoke sub-vocally as well. “Ignore it, but go ahead and lay most of our cards on the table. Her response will tell us a lot. She could even choose to be helpful.”

  Elissa turned back to Rhianna who slid a hand along her arm. “Your skin has a strange texture,” the woman said, “like warm glass.” She smiled. “You’re not breakable, are you?”

  “Not easily, no, but you were asking about our interest in you. It’s not you exactly that bring us here, but someone who vanished without a trace in this place.”

  Watching carefully, Chim saw a tiny guilty start that indicated Rhianna knew exactly who they were talking about. Belatedly, she raised an eyebrow in innocent inquiry. “Who are you talking about?”

  Elissa glowered. You know who we want and you know where he is.”

  “Really, I don’t!” Rhianna continued to run her hand along Elissa arm.

  Chim decided that it was meant as a distraction as well as a sign of interest.

  “Look,” Elissa said. “We can’t kick up too big a fuss about this. There are political reasons why this person’s adventures shouldn’t come to light. You know that, too. Just hand him over, unless his excesses have killed him or something.”

  “But what if he doesn’t want to go? What if I am making a truly staggering amount of credits, offering questionable services to this … person?”

  Chim joined the conversation. “You need incentive? Some sort of financial compensation?”

  Rhianna kept her gaze on Elissa, letting it roam freely. “Some sort of inducement. After all, I’d be losing a lot.” She leaned in, bringing her lips close to Elissa’s face, speaking for her alone. “Think you can make it worth my while?”

  “I’m taken,” Elissa said.

  Rhianna pulled back with obvious reluctance, a theatrically sad expression on her face. “That’s too bad. I’d really like to help, but…”

  “How confident are you of winning the game when play resumes?” Chim asked.

  Rhianna let her confidant smile answer the question.

  “What are you thinking, Chim?” Elissa’s voice held a sharp edge.

  “How about this?” he suggested. “A winner-takes-all bet. If we win, you honor my side bets and produce the prince for us, immediately.”

  “And if I win?” Rhianna leaned forward so her breasts were pressed against Elissa. “What’s my reward?”

  Elissa closed her eyes a moment, as if steeling herself for some ultimate sacrifice. Though her body was, in effect, a pattern of solidified energy, her well-endowed chest rose with the semblance of a deep breath. “Me,” she said, “for a night.”

  “That’s not enough.”

  Elissa’s tone grew frosty and indignant. “I beg your pardon?”

  “I want a signed employment contract putting you at my beck and call for an Earth Standard year. Your duties will be whatever I decide, whenever I decide.”

  “What!” Elissa suddenly stood, sending her breasts bouncing in an enticing manner.

  “What’s wrong?” Rhianna asked. “Don’t you have any confidence in your ability to win?”

  “Yeah,” Chim asked. “Don’t you?”

  “Chim! You’d put me at risk?”

  “What risk?” he sub-vocalized. “I know you. I have total faith in you. I’d bet my life on your play any day.”

  She clasped her hands, turning toward him, offering Rhianna an inadvertent view of her backside. Rhianna made no objection. Elissa’s eyes grew teary with joy. “Oh, Chim!” She sub-vocalized, “That’s so sweet!” Her voice went audible, “All right, I’ll do it.”

  Rhianna rose. “I’ll take care of the details and meet you back at the play station in half an hour.

  Chim rose. “Fine.”

  Rhianna and her security men left the area. Chim sub-vocalized to speak to Elissa privately. “I’m not sure I trust her to keep her word. Dress a drone in one of my exo-suits and walk it over here. With an x-class agent visibly on the scene, Rhianna will have to honor her wagers.”

  “What if something weird happens,” Elissa asked, “and I actually lose?”

  “You’re species isn’t officially recognized. Any employment document you sign has no legal force.”

  “Oh! You’re right. You don’t play fair, do you?”

  “Not if I can help it.”

  Her voice became audible. “Our drinks are here. Let’s have a toast to victory.”

  He took the ginger ale. “How are you going to consume anything? You don’t have a digestive tract, do you?”

  “That’s not a problem. I just create a pocket of dead space inside me to hold what I swallow while I can volatize the molecular structure.”

  “In other words, you have a blast furnace for a stomach.”

  “Well, that’s putting it a bit indelicately, but…yes, that’s true.”

  He threw back his drink, and grinned at her. “You continually manage to astound me.”

  She responded with a kiss. “I love you too.”

  Chim stood behind Elissa’s seat. In the crowd behind him, covered with a dark hooded cloak, his remotely operated exo-suit waited to be unveiled if needed. Rhianna occupied her former place with her entourage in attendance. Mr. Edge held the employment contract on a digital clipboard. It only needed to be signed. That would happen if Elissa wasn’t as good as she thought.

  Rhianna reactivated play on the computer. “I believe it’s my turn.” She used her turn to enter a conversion formula. “You’ve got some fancy moves, but I’m ending this on my next turn, girlfriend.”

  The data in the holo-field went spastic. Symbols fragmented, dissolving into unwinding sheets of zeros and ones. Chim was stunned. Damn, she’s gone binary! That’s beyond old school, it’s prehistoric!

  “Cute, but not cute enough.” Elissa entered a final statement, also in zeros and ones. The computer decided that no further entry was possible. The game was called in her favor. They’d won.

  Rhianna blinked, showing no emotion for a long moment until a slow smile possessed her lips. She sighed. “Too bad. We would have been good toget
her.”

  Elissa slid out of her chair, standing. “Like I told you, I’m taken. Now, where’s my prize?”

  Mr. Edge approached, skirting the game. “We honor our debts. You’ll find the prince outside, passed out in the trunk of an aircar. He’s still alive despite an orgy of self-abuse like few I’ve ever seen. He may need a blood transfusion to flush certain self-induced toxins from his system.” He held out the clipboard. The contract was gone. It now held a title—for the planet. Chim had forgotten about his side bet.

  He took the clipboard and signed.

  A few minutes later, he piloted the aircar toward the spaceport birth that held their ship. Its extensive medical bay contained all the resources require by the prince in the trunk. They’d have taken him out but they needed the backseat for the exo-suited drone.

  “One thing I don’t get,” Chim said.

  Elissa looked at him from the adjoining seat. “What’s that, Lover?”

  “What was that winning entry you made in Tandem? My binary is a little rusty.”

  “You mean nonexistent.”

  “You going to tell me?”

  “It’s no big secret, really. I simply transformed certainty into

  uncertainty. One is zero. Zero is one. The whole equation devolved into unmanageable chaos.”

  “In other words—”

  She grinned. “Yes is no is yes is no is yes is no is—”

  He nodded. “Yeah, that really says it all.”

  INTERLUDE

  “So,” the interrogator asked, “what is Project-X supposed to do with a luxury planet devoted to gambling, tourism, and excess of every kind?”

  Chim shrugged. “If you don’t want it, I’ll keep it. I’ll need a hobby, if I live long enough to retire. Either that, or you could let Xanadu Corporation run it, and funnel our take into a benevolent charity of some kind.”

  There was a startled silence. Finally, his interrogator spoke. “Actually, that’s not a bad idea. You do have a gift for thinking outside the box.”

  Another voice interrupted. “Outside the box? What about outside the galaxy? I’m not comfortable with many of these so-called solutions.”

  “If you want to talk specifics,” Chim said, “do so. Otherwise—”

  The new interrogator held his ground. “Oh, I’ll get specific, but you’ll regret it.”

  “Take your best shot,” Chim said. “Apparently, I’m not going anywhere for a while.”

  “That’s enough!”

  A very female, very familiar, voice arrived as a sunburst shattered the darkness beyond Chim’s island of light. The restraining field that held him failed. His suit systems rebooted as the chamber lights came up to full. He made out the others in the room. They wore the same gear he did, x-class agents all. I thought I’d recognized some of those voices.

  Looking up into the air, he saw a great incandescent shape fanning rippling wings of crimson. His comm implant came to life. A small voice unwound inside his ear. “Don’t worry Chim. I’m here for you!”

  “Elissa!”

  “You bet your tin-plated ass. I finally tracked you down. Can you believe it? These guys didn’t want to tell me you’d been dragged before a disciplinary council. It took me forever to wheedle out the access codes from the station AI system, but better late than never.”

  The bloody phoenix settled before him, taking on the curves of a human female. The bird head became a heart-shaped face framed with a wild gleaming mane. Wings became arms. Elissa turned and backed into him, as if shielding him from weapon fire. It was still strange to him to see her in red instead of gold. He wasn’t yet used to the color shift.

  “Whatever judgment you face,” she said, “is mine as well. We’re a team, for better or worse, ‘til the end of time. There’s no way I’m staying outta this.”

  “Get her out of here!” an x-class agent demanded.

  Another agent countermanded the order. “No, wait. She has served the Imperium well. She has a right to be here.”

  “Highly unusual,” someone remarked. “But Chim’s future as a guardsman is on the line.”

  Another visored agent addressed Chim. “Tell us about how you lost Prince Morgan—”

  “That mushroom-chomping bilge-swilling knuckle-dragging space-rat!” Elissa’s voice surged with contempt as she highjacked the question. “Talk about a waste of sentience… The Empress should have strangled him at birth and spared us all this.”

  “While true,” Chim said, “it’s not nice to speak ill of the dead.”

  “He was not a nice person,” Elissa retorted. “His new role in the universe is a decided improvement.”

  One of the interrogators stepped closer. “Suppose we go over your account of his accidental conversion on New Avalon.”

  Chim shrugged. “Sure. Well, as you know, we lifted off the Xanadu Corporate planet, heading to the throne world with the prince. He shouldn’t have been with us long, but we were diverted in route by the inevitable request for assistance…”

  10. THE TULGEY WOODS

  Chim entered medical bay, and approached the patient. Wreathed in bubbles, suspended in a nutrient bath, the young man looked starved and scraggly with several days of beard on his face. Asleep, he breathed through a respirator while tubes drew his blood through a machine and back into his body, filtering out exotic toxins.

  A photonic projection shimmered in beside Chim, keeping him company. Elissa’s beauty was heart-stopping, stealing his breath like a kick to the gut. His gaze clung to her perfection, but his voice was all business. “So, what was he on?”

  Elissa sniffed disdainfully. “What wasn’t he on is a better question. There are synthetics in his tox report that have never made any databank, and all the fashionable designer drugs you can name. There are signs of long-term abuse. He’s had surgery to replace rotted organs and there’s been extensive cerebral remapping to bypass damaged brain areas. Probably has severe personality disorders as well.”

  The prince had a life of privilege, the best of everything, with doors open to him that were closed to others. There was so much he could have done—could have been—but too many indulged him, including the prince himself.

  “If he goes on this way,” Chim said, “he’ll be dead in six months. It’s a good thing the position of Emperor isn’t hereditary. Can you image this guy running the Imperium?”

  “Scary thought,” Elissa said. “Think we should keep him sedated until we get him back to the Throne World?”

  “Just what he needs; more drugs. No, when you’re done with his blood, decant him and lock him in a stateroom. I don’t want him underfoot.”

  “You know he’ll pitch a fit about being confined, even by an x-class agent with the authority to order the deaths of entire worlds.”

  Chim shrugged. “Give him a stack of complaint forms and a broken, red crayon. I’ll take his scribbling under advisement.”

  “Looks like he’ll be with us longer than expected; I’ve just received a request for assistance forwarded from the Imperial Diplomatic Corp.

  There are planetary coordinates and an encrypted data dump as well.”

  “Delay can’t be helped then. I’m going to the bridge,” Chim said.

  “See you there.”

  He left the bay and found a lift tube. Repolarized gravity thrust him up to the bridge. In front of the captain’s chair, a wrap-around holo-screen displayed the star-field surging past the ship. Monitor stations along the bulkhead showed the status of all ship systems as he sat down.

  A golden ghost appeared out of thin air beside him. Acquiring density, her hand fell on his forearm, sliding toward his hand. He meshed fingers with her. In his mind, this photonic ghost was Elissa, even though he knew her real body lay in engineering, in an aquarium cyber-linked to the ship. An alien jellyfish dreaming in sea water, her mind possessed the vessel, integrated with all its systems. Knowing what she really was didn’t stop him from loving her. Like the air he breathed, she was necessary to his surviva
l. Having found a lost piece of his soul in her, he could never let her go.

  They were both defined by Imperium technology: as she was wedded to the vessel, he was dependent on his dark green cling suit with its gold and silver neural interface patches. They bonded his neural net to his exo persona. Outside the ship, his armored frame hid his humanity, transforming him into an unstoppable force. As a steel titan, he surpassed the military’s best combat exo-suits. X-class agents had the best because they were expected to provide any needed miracle, holding the far-flung galactic empire together with bailing wire and chewing gum.

  It wasn’t a job he could do without a living ship and the comm implant in his head that provided an untraceable, undetectable link. She put the data of the Imperium at his metaphorical fingertips.

  “Where are we going,” Chim asked.

  “New Avalon,” Elissa said. “It’s a heavily forested planet, just off our previous course. We’ve had a colony there for seven years now.”

  The star-scape blinked out, replaced by vid-stills. The first picture showed a blue-green world under the swirl of cloud cover—an orbital shot. The following scenes were ground level. There were trees that towered thousands of feet, with puffy leaves on yellow stems. The leaves were the size of houses, shading from apple green to lime. Beneath the canopy, turquoise beams of sunlight slashed hunter green shadows. Chim saw magenta and rose-colored beetles waving feelers, perched atop boulders coated with maroon moss. In a forest glade, there was a group shot of humans with splatter guns, holding up various trophies. One of them was a blue spider the size of a large dog. Night scenes followed, lit by the planet’s various moons. Against the largest of these, one picture showed a stream of silver-winged moths. Fluttering erratically, the child-sized creatures left a fine glittering of scales in their wake.

  “It’s enchanting,” Chim said. “What kind of a problem could they have that requires our intervention there?”

  “They thought the planet perfect for settlement, with few dangerous predators, and no indication of native sentiency—until now.”