Two days passed. Days in which Curt could have sought revenge but didn’t. Sasha was released from the hospital. I took her home to the apartment. It was a one-room affair, similar to my pad on Earth, though a good deal cleaner. I was proud of the artificial roses on the fold-down table and hoped she’d like them. “So,” I said, gesturing to the room, the blanket that divided her sleeping space from mine and the miniscule kitchen, “what do you think?”
“I think it’s wonderful,” Sasha said sincerely. “And I love the roses. Thank you.”
My heart swelled with pride. “She liked it! Not only that, but I found and paid for it all by myself! Well, almost by myself, since Joy had helped.
Life was good, truly good, or so I thought as I left for work. Sasha was better, the worst was behind us, and the end of the assignment was in sight. Yeah, right.
The club was half empty when I got there, with only a scattering of customers left over from the first shift. I grabbed a cup of really bad coffee from the bar, sauntered over to my favorite stainless-steel table, and took a seat. I hadn’t been there for more than a moment before a man sidled up, pulled over a chair, and sat down. I was just about to snarl at him when I saw who it was. An ugly orange jumpsuit had replaced the green coat, but the man was the same. Still combed, still serious, and still Nigel Trask, greenie extraordinaire. He smiled, and the frown lines vanished. “Hello, Mr. Maxon. We meet again.”
I lifted my coffee cup in a mock salute. “We certainly do. Take a hike.”
Trask spread his hands on the tabletop. “Now, is that any way to speak to someone who traveled halfway across the solar system to see you?”
I got to my feet. “You people are nuts. First you try to kill me, then you want to talk. Get out before I throw you out.”
Trask stood. “All right, take it easy. The Mars thing was a mistake. I opposed it, but the locals disobeyed my orders.”
“They sure as hell did. Now get out. I won’t say it again.”
Trask backed away. “Okay, okay. But Trans-Solar knows you’re here, and would’ve nailed you too, if Curt was smarter. One of us will get you, Maxon, mark my words, and we’re nicer than they are.”
I stepped forward. He turned and walked away. I watched him go. Things were getting complicated, real complicated, and Sasha would want to know. I resolved to tell her the moment that I went off duty.
Time passed. The second shift got off and flooded in through the doors. I kept a sharp eye out for Curt, his friends, and anyone who looked like a popper. I saw some, but they were regulars. I watched them anyway.
A fight broke out. I cleared it. A spacer threatened to commit suicide. Betty and I talked her out of it. A miner slapped his girlfriend. I decked him. Then, just as I was helping him up off the floor, all hell broke loose.
A chair flew through the air. Insults were exchanged. Fists started to fly. I pushed and shoved my way through the quickly gathering crowd. When I reached the center of the disturbance, I found that four men were pushing each other around. Not fighting, mind you, just shoving the way kids do, and calling each other names. I was just about to break it up when they turned on me.
What ensued was quick, professional, and well coordinated. A man wrapped his arms around my chest, smiled, and blew mint-fresh breath in my face. I tried to move and found that I couldn’t. My feet were lifted clear of the ground. Something bit my left thigh. My thoughts slid apart, reassembled themselves in strange ways, and swirled as the chemicals pulled me downwards. Complete and total darkness followed.
I awoke to the smell of freshly brewed coffee. Not all at once, mind you, but gradually, until I wanted a steaming hot cup of Americano in the worst possible way.
It seemed as though my eyes were glued shut. It took a conscious effort to force them open. First the right, then the left. The picture was bleary. I blinked it clear. A room full of empty desks, computer consoles, and office equipment surrounded me. The clutter gave the impression of employees who might return at any moment. Curt sat two feet in front of me. A bandage covered the bridge of his nose. A thin red line signaled where the garrote had been buried in his neck. I sensed people behind me but couldn’t see them. My arms and legs were bound to a chair. The lifer nodded pleasantly and took a sip of coffee. “Well, look who decided to join us. Welcome back.”
I tried to muster a smart-assed reply but couldn’t seem to come up with one. Curt nodded understandingly. “A little short on repartee? That’s too bad, but nothing to be ashamed of, considering your low IQ.”
Curt took another sip of coffee and gestured with his cup. “Tell me something, Max, how smart are you, anyway? Nothing to say? Well, the experts say you have an IQ of about eighty, realizing that most people score between ninety and a hundred. Not too good, is it? Nothing like the 124 you scored prior to joining the Mishimuto Marines. They say you were one smart hombre back then, until you checked into a research station called T-12 that is, and had your ass kicked. Do you remember T-12?”
I mustered some saliva and used it to moisten my mouth. “Yeah, sort of.”
Curt nodded agreeably. “I thought so. And after your capture? Do you remember what happened then?”
I tried to shrug. The ropes made it difficult. “Bits and pieces. Nothing much.”
“And the girl? What did she tell you?”
I thought of Sasha and whatever it was that she’d been hiding. “I asked but she didn’t tell me anything.”
Curt placed his coffee cup on a table and leaned back in his chair. “Not too surprising, because if she told you the truth you’d run to us instead of away from us.”
I felt an almost overwhelming need to know what he knew, to be in on the secret, to understand my past. “I would?”
“Yes,” Curt replied quietly, “you would. Here’s what Sasha Casad doesn’t want you to know…Her mother, a more than competent physicist named Marsha Casad, worked for a company called Protech. She and a group of other scientists came up with a breakthrough, something worth a lot of money, and were just about to cash in on it when the war started. We know, because one of her closest associates was employed by us. Unfortunately for Dr. Casad and her fellow entrepreneurs, Protech was taken over by rank-and-file employees, and the scientists had little choice but to go along for the ride. A ride that started guess where?”
“On an asteroid called T-12?”
Curt pointed a finger in my direction. “Bingo! Not bad for an idiot. So, along comes Captain Maxon and his gung-ho Marines. They attack, get waxed, and the survivors wind up as prisoners.”
Curt leaned forward so the front legs of his chair hit the floor with a thump. “Now pay attention, Maxon, because this is the interesting part. It seems that Marsha Casad and her scientist friends had no desire to share their newfound discovery with the great unwashed horde. But where to hide it? In the computers that any tool head worth his or her salt could hack? On cubes the unionists could check? No, they needed something better, a hiding place where no one would ever think to look.”
I waited for Curt to continue, but he shook his head and smiled. He wanted me to think of it, to solve the puzzle with what was left of my brain, to…My god! That was it! The bastards had stored their data in my brain! Had used me as a zombie, or a near zombie, leaving just enough mental capacity to survive.
Curt saw the understanding fill my eyes and laughed. “That’s right, stupid. Sasha Casad was guarding you rather than the other way around. She may not look very imposing, but Sasha Casad has been in training for this mission since she was born.”
It all came back. The countless times when Sasha had been more competent than she should’ve been, when people came after me instead of her, when I should’ve smelled a rat. But not me, oh no, I was too stupid for that.
I fought the bonds, tried to pull free, but hands gripped my shoulders. Curt waggled a finger in my direction. “Naughty, naughty! We wouldn’t want to damage that shiny little head, now would we? Not after all we’ve been through. There were others,
you know. Backups. A man and a woman. The man committed suicide shortly after discharge. I found the woman in a mental institution. Our shrinks siphoned a lot of crap out of her head, but very little of it made sense. That’s the trouble with schizos. They make piss-poor storage modules. The R&D types are working on that. We have high hopes for you, though.”
I remembered the greenie called Philip Bey, how he’d told me about the others, and how Sasha had refused to comment. The rotten little bitch. I struggled but the ropes held me in place.
“So,” Curt said, getting to his feet, and cracking his knuckles. “Enough of this bullshit. First, I’m going to break your nose. Then we’re going to drain your brain, dump the data to my pet zombie, and beat Protech to the punch. Adios, asshole.”
Curt planted his feet, pulled his fist back, and swung. I tipped my head forward, felt the impact on the top of my skull, and heard him scream. He was still dancing around holding his broken hand when a tox dart took him in the neck. He looked surprised, tried to say something, and collapsed.
I heard a commotion, tried to turn, and felt the hands leave my shoulders. Someone yelled, “Shoot her!” and swore as he took a dart. Feet scuffled, dart guns hissed, and bodies thumped as they hit the floor. That was when Joy appeared next to my knee, scrambled onto my lap, and went to work on my bonds. She was her usual exuberant self.
“Damn boss…you get yourself into the most amazing situations! I followed you here, called Sasha, and hung around until she arrived. Sorry it took so long. Are you okay?”
The last of the ropes fell away. I stood. My wrists hurt. I rubbed them to restore the circulation. “Yeah, I’m fine, thanks to you.”
Joy giggled happily, made her way up to my shoulder, and grabbed my ear. I turned to find three bodies sprawled on the floor, the zombie huddled in a corner, and Sasha going through someone’s wallet. “What the hell are you doing?”
She didn’t even glance in my direction. “Borrowing some money so we can get the hell out of here.”
I shook my head. “The farce is over, Sasha. Curt told me all about it. How your mother used me, how you lied, the whole thing.”
Sasha looked up. I couldn’t place her expression. Was it concern I saw? Relief? Or another part of the performance she’d been trained to give? There was no way to know. “I’m sorry, Max, I really am. I wanted to tell but promised I wouldn’t.”
I searched for the words that would tell her how much it hurt, how much I hated her guts, but couldn’t find them. So I walked to the door, stepped through, and heard it close behind me.
I walked for a long time. Through the residential areas good and bad, past the heavily guarded scientific section, and out into the cathedral-sized atrium. It was one of those things that the corpies hated to pay for, but did because the shrinks said the workers would go bonkers if they didn’t.
The park consisted of carefully maintained flower gardens, patches of green grass, and gravel-covered paths. The gravel had been coated with white paint, but most of it had worn off. Genetically engineered trees grew around the edges and softened the hard gray rock behind them.
It occurred to me that the vegetation served to supply supplemental oxygen as well, and I wondered where the thought had come from. How did I know that? Was I as stupid as Curt said? What part was me and what part wasn’t? My thoughts whirled, and my head started to hurt.
People strolled around me, clustering around the trees as if seeking strength from them, or shelter from the duraplast sky.
A pair of Zeebs, both women, looked my way, invented a “chrome-headed weirdo with a robot on his shoulder” category, and dropped me inside it. They subvocalized to each other and watched me from the corners of their eyes as they passed.
I sat on a park bench, tried to look normal, and let my chin rest on a fist. The knowledge of what had been done to my head, what had been hidden in my brain, weighed heavily and increased the pain. I forced myself to think, to wonder what it was that Sasha’s mother had sacrificed my life to, and if I would approve of it. What had she hidden there, at the center of my being? A medical miracle? A doomsday weapon? And what should I do about it? Blow my brains out? Make my way back to Earth? What?
A bright red ball rolled towards me and came to rest against my foot. A little boy ran up, wiped his nose with the back of his hand, and said, “Ball. My ball.”
I forced a smile and toed the ball in his direction. He picked it up, said, “My ball” again, and ran away.
“My ball.” The words seemed to echo through my mind, transformed themselves into “my head,” and refused to go away.
Suddenly I had it, one of those wonderful moments of clarity that had rescued me in the past, and knew what I wanted to do. Must do. My head belonged to me, damn it, regardless of what Marsha Casad had stashed there, and I would decide whether it would be released or not. So, given the fact that the greenies didn’t seem to know much more than I did, and Curt wasn’t about to tell, I had little choice but to obtain the information from Sasha’s mother. And do so without getting caught, brain-drained, or killed. All of which reminded me of Sasha, my little bodyguard, liar, and corpie-in-training. I would use her just as she had used me.
The decision felt good. I grinned, scared the hell out of a little girl, and headed for our apartment. Dr. Casad had sent for me, and I was on the way.
17
“The captain and crew request your attendance at the Jupiter Ball. Please RSVP.”
From the invitation sent to passengers aboard the Solar Queen
A lot of people would like to take the grand tour, but few can afford it. Those who can choose between two great ships, the Solar Queen and the Solar Princess, both owned and operated by the Regis Line, one of the few companies to go head-to-head with Trans-Solar and emerge at least even, if not slightly ahead. And that’s why Sasha and I felt reasonably safe boarding the Queen. Trans-Solar might have agents aboard, but we could count on Regis security to keep them in check. Or so we hoped.
Once we were aboard, the ship would become part of a journey that had started on Earth, paused off Mars, and stopped in the belt on the way to Jupiter and Europa Station. The very place we wanted to go.
Like the Princess, the Queen had been designed to meet the rigorous demands of the extremely wealthy, none of whom were anywhere near the C Deck lock, through which lowlies like ourselves passed. The line was fairly long and consisted of robots, zombies, and freelancers.
One of them, a woman with blonde hair, blue eyes, and bright red lips, caught my attention. She was one person ahead of me in line and stood out from the rest. Maybe it was the way she held herself, the carefully coordinated clothes, or the expensive perfume that floated back to tease my nostrils.
Whatever it was caught and held my attention. She seemed to sense my interest, turned, and smiled. I felt a sudden sense of warmth and smiled back. But months of running had made me wary. Yes, she could be attracted to my obvious charm and rugged good looks, but there were other possibilities as well. What if she was a killer in nice-lady drag? An assassin android? Or a carefully disguised bomb? Still, she looked innocent enough, and my libido said she was the greatest thing since sliced bread. I was getting ready to say or do something stupid when the line jerked forward and took her with it.
I turned and saw Sasha frown. She had monitored the interchange and didn’t approve. Well, too bad. Gone were the days when she gave orders and I obeyed. I had my own reasons for going to Europa Station now, reasons that went beyond the fifty K they had used for bait, and it didn’t matter if Sasha came along or not. I appreciated the fact that she had stolen enough money to pay her fare, and would cover my back if it came to a firefight, but could get along without her too. And she knew it. So the silence was complete as we stepped through the hatch, waited for the lock to cycle open, and entered the Queen’s opulent interior.
Everything was spotless, even on C Deck, which was a far cry from the glory found on A and B. In space there is nothing so rare and friv
olous as genuine wood, and that’s what the ship’s architects had used to cover the standard durasteel bulkheads. Everywhere I looked I saw highly polished wood, brass fittings, and deep pile carpets. It made quite a contrast to life on the barge.
Sasha had suggested that we share a stateroom in order to reduce expenses and enhance security, but I said no. The less I saw of the traitorous little minx the better, and besides, some privacy would be nice for a change.
Though smaller than the cabin I had occupied aboard the Red Trader, my stateroom managed to be a good deal more luxurious. The plumbing worked, for one thing, never a surety aboard the Trader, and there were lots of extras too, like a high-quality virtual reality entertainment console, a fully stocked minibar, a toaster-sized automaid that nearly went crazy trying to pick up after me, plus rotating storage lockers that could accommodate a large, but in my case nonexistent, wardrobe.
So, doing my best to get into the spirit of the thing and enjoy the many amenities, I took a long, wasteful shower, left the thick terrycloth towel for the automaid to tow away, donned my most presentable set of clothes, and set out to explore the rest of my temporary home. Joy wasn’t too happy about being left behind, but I figured I was noticeable enough without a miniature android perched on my shoulder. The hatch closed on her protests.
I set out for the far reaches of C Deck, knowing that while A and B Decks might have been more interesting, the denizens of C Deck weren’t allowed to visit their betters without a specific invitation to do so.
The corridor curved gently to the right. Almost everyone I encountered, children excepted, managed to ignore my chrome-plated scalp and smile at me. It was as if my head had been magically transformed from the grotesque to the merely eccentric.
The change puzzled me at first. What the heck was going on? Were these people especially nice? Or was there a more believable explanation? After giving the matter some thought, I decided that I was the accidental beneficiary of “situational niceness.”
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