Hellhole Inferno

by Brian Herbert

  “Don’t forget how those powerful aliens nearly wrecked the Commodore’s fleet with their mysterious powers. We don’t know yet if the new warship shielding will be effective against that kind of attack.”

  Michella frowned. “I am assured by some of our best military minds that the new precautions will work, because they must work.” She seemed confident, or perhaps she just wanted to believe that her forces would finally succeed, despite past failures. She had refused to give the Black Lord any opportunity to study the only physical specimens they had of the aliens, which might have given the weapons engineers additional information; she absolutely insisted that the multiple layers of quarantine never be disturbed.

  “Those hideous aliens already damaged our stringline hub, Ishop. We can’t just sit here and wait for them to overwhelm the Crown Jewels. We have to go on the offensive, don’t we? We have to keep probing, trying to find their weaknesses.”

  “Yes,” he said with a hard smile. “We already know there are cracks in the General’s supposedly unified rebellion. Tehila is the prime example, but we know of unrest on Hossetea as well. And there may be other hot spots.”

  “Hossetea? Where is that? Who ever heard of Hossetea?”

  “You used to rule it, Eminence. It is one of the fifty-four Deep Zone worlds.”

  “And I will rule it again, when we put an end to this nonsense.” Despite her insistence that she wasn’t hungry, Michella ate several of the small sandwiches. Ishop just sipped strong black tea on the terrace, and when he didn’t answer, she pressed, “Don’t you agree?”

  “Of course, Eminence.”

  She grew more cordial, as if she’d already forgotten the debacle with the servants. “Are you comfortable in your new apartment? Is there enough room for you and your pretty little assistant?” She seemed to be teasing him.

  “My assistant is currently away on business, and I have been too busy to go back to the apartment.” He smiled stiffly. Laderna had already departed on her secret mission to Sandusky, to find and kill the Diadem’s hidden sister. “You know as well as I do, she isn’t all that pretty.”

  “As long as you appreciate the gesture I made. It is my reward to you for your fine service.”

  Ishop hated that apartment, loathed this withered scab of a woman. He felt like squeezing his fingers around the Diadem’s neck until she stopped breathing. Thanks to Laderna, Haveeda Duchenet would soon be dead. That would not give him the same joy as murdering the vile Michella … but it was a step in the right direction.

  “You could even be in line for larger rewards, if things go well for you.” The Diadem’s tone was either tempting or taunting. “You mentioned wanting a planet of your own?”

  Surprised, he looked across the table at her. “You’ve changed your mind, Eminence? As I mentioned before, Enva Tazaar’s former planet would be perfect, and I promise not to disappoint you—”

  When Michella laughed, the cruel sound cut through him. “Don’t be silly! Orsini is too important, but planet Hallholme is a possibility, if anything’s left after we’re through with it. Once General Adolphus is crushed, I might find a way to give that world to you as a reward, so you can impose my will.”

  “Hellhole?” He heard an edge of anger in his own voice, tried to calm himself. “Eminence, I appreciate your generosity, but I am more suited to living in the Crown Jewels than in the Deep Zone.” A slow death for her … yes, it would be more satisfying.

  She sipped her tea and smiled, not seeming to realize how much he detested the very sight of her. “That’s all right, dear Ishop. I’d rather have you here with me anyway.”

  13

  In performing services for her boss and lover, Laderna had traveled extensively, though few people ever noticed her movements. She was unobtrusive, intentionally so, and curious. She had gone to various Crown Jewel planets where particular nobles lived. No one saw her arrive or leave … but when she was done, the target was no longer alive.

  The “List,” as she and Ishop called it, had originally contained the names of twelve noble families—powerful families who had disgraced and destroyed the respected Osheer house centuries ago, then left them to wallow in obscurity afterward. When Laderna discovered the truth about his heritage, how his descendants had hidden or forgotten their past, Ishop had insisted on an appropriate form of revenge. Together, they had selected a representative from each family to die. Just to be fair.

  Of course, the descendants had nothing personally to do with the ancient crime against Ishop’s family, but the punishment was still easy to rationalize because the modern representatives of those twelve families had benefited from the ignoble acts of their predecessors. It was only appropriate for them to pay a price.

  Together, Ishop and Laderna had chosen the ones most deserving to die, or easiest to kill—and the two of them had made a game of going methodically through the names, taking turns or working together. Only the name of Duchenet remained.

  Now, as she stood at a window in a business hotel on Sandusky, Laderna smiled with anticipation. The streets of the capital city of Zensan bustled with efficient activity, commerce, research, secrecy; though it had a small population, Sandusky was still one of the core Crown Jewel worlds, run well by the Zenns, a noble family that made a great deal of money selling biological products developed in their advanced laboratories.

  Having checked into the hotel several days ago under an assumed name and cleverly forged documents, Laderna had observed activities in Zensan and the surrounding countryside, particularly noting the isolated research complexes. She inquired, ostensibly on behalf of her “fiancé,” about working at one of the Zenn laboratories.

  In preparation, digging deeper, she had learned details about Michella Duchenet. Her brother Jamos had been found dead (the matter muddied and covered up), and Haveeda had suffered psychological problems before disappearing decades ago. Laderna had her own suspicions about Michella’s murderous personality, even at an early age, and that her sister had been pressed into silence. Extreme silence. She’d vanished without a trace.

  But Laderna would find her. And kill her … a pathetic representative of the last family name on the list. It was the victory she needed, and she wasn’t convinced Michella would even be disappointed about it.

  As she performed her quiet investigations on Sandusky, Laderna did not risk bringing up the name of Haveeda or Duchenet. She baited a man in a highbrow cocktail bar by asking him if any famous people lived around there. He’d rattled off the names of eminent biological researchers, as well as nobles. Then, while nursing a drink, he’d added, “Of course, some say the Diadem’s sister lives on Sandusky as well.”

  Laderna controlled her excitement. “I suppose she’s in one of those mansions on Fairhaven Hill, with panoramic views of the city and the mountains.”

  “No one’s seen her in years.” He snorted. “I hear she’s in a sanitarium just outside of town.”

  In ensuing days, Laderna had tracked down four sanitariums on Sandusky. One of them, the Cove Institute, specialized in the discreet institutionalization of members from the wealthiest families, keeping them out of the public eye so they could cause no further embarrassment. The managers of the sanitarium ran the facility like a high-security bank, refusing to reveal who their clients were. Laderna made a visit of her own, by now with a fully developed story.

  The Cove Institute was an elegant old structure built of rare green marble that reminded Laderna of the facets of an unusual jewel. The building was six stories tall and expansive, with four wings extending from a central core. The entrance featured immense white columns and the statues of famous Sanduskan scientists in heroic poses.

  In the echoing entrance hall, Laderna gave her false name and offered the story that she and her fiancé were considering a move to Sandusky. Then she lowered her voice and added that his wealthy family was concerned about the well-being of a troublesome, mentally ill uncle. At the mention of wealth, the clerk sent for what she called an “a
dviser” to consult with Laderna.

  Minutes later, a pink-cheeked man in a spotless white lab coat identified himself as Johan Zenn. Assuming he was a member of the planet’s ruling family, she was taken aback. Yes, perhaps she had found the place hiding Haveeda.

  She reached out to shake his hand. “Very nice to meet you.”

  His grip was limp, his blue eyes dull. “I’ll show you some of our facility. I could recommend the best form of commitment for a troubled family member.”

  “My fiancé’s uncle has been increasingly unstable, blaming his family for all of his failures in life. He’s unable to work and has made many disturbing and irrational comments. We are all quite worried about him.” She looked around. “Perhaps he would feel at home in a place like this. Cost is no object.”

  He nodded. “I understand completely. Let me show you around.”

  “I assume you have different levels of security for the various patients,” Laderna said. “For someone of his stature, we want the greatest discretion and confidence.”

  The facility was as clean and spotless as Zenn’s lab coat. The sanitarium, down every corridor in every wing, was of an old classic design, but the materials looked surprisingly new, with no patina of age. Several of the sections had viewing glass, so she could look inside and see patients in communal surroundings, or lab workers doing biological research on the leading causes of mental illness.

  In the east wing, they passed a section devoid of viewing windows, and Laderna saw a very young woman in a lab coat enter through a metal door after pressing her hand against a scanner plate. The door closed before Laderna could see inside.

  “I find your facility most interesting, Mr. Zenn,” she said.

  * * *

  Three nights later, after following one of the maintenance women home, she presented the woman with an enormous bribe—more than she was likely to see in the rest of her working life. Laderna found it extremely ironic that the funds she was using to corrupt this employee came directly from Diadem Michella’s largesse to Ishop.

  From her tour and other surreptitious investigations, Laderna had the general layout of the Cove Institute, as well as a sense of their security measures. Fortunately, the sanitarium’s security was primarily designed to control the patients and prevent them from breaking out. Slipping in should be much less of a challenge.

  The maintenance woman was adept, hardworking, and reliable. When Laderna met her in the small, rented hotel room, the woman was furtive and nervous. She brought images of the full floor plan of the institute, blueprints of ventilation systems, electrical grids, even a time chart of security personnel. “I brought you everything I could get hold of. It took a great deal of searching. Not easy,” the woman said, as if hinting at something—more pay, no doubt—which Laderna studiously ignored. She saw a list of patient designations, but without names. She could crunch the information, though, and extract specifics. Since she already suspected where Haveeda Duchenet was being held, she could approach the answer from multiple directions.

  “And how do I get inside in the first place?” Laderna asked.

  The maintenance woman was sweating. “That’ll be harder. Every employee is coded into the security system, allowed inside only during designated shifts. A palm-print scanner verifies my identity before I can get through the door, and I won’t be allowed to slip a second person into the facility. There are weight sensors to verify it.”

  Laderna assessed the maintenance woman, confirmed that they were nearly the same size; the woman’s brown uniform would fit her well enough. “I have a way around that,” she said.

  After Laderna had killed the woman, donned her clothing, and gathered up her severed hand, she was ready to go.

  After midnight, Laderna used the woman’s cold palm print to pass through the identity scanner at the Cove Institute’s rear entrance. Once she launched her operation, speed would be vital. She had no interest in covering her tracks or being subtle—she wanted Michella Duchenet to know that her sister had been a very specific target. She needed to work her way through the facility with all possible speed, dispatch Haveeda, and then disappear. For Ishop.

  Wearing the facility’s uniform, Laderna arrived at the central guard station, where she stunned the guard and disabled the surveillance system. She had memorized the floor plan, the blueprints of the systems, and had crunched through the patient IDs; she was convinced she knew where the Diadem’s sister had been held all these years. It was probably a tiny, pampered apartment in the facility, someplace where Haveeda could cause no trouble. Laderna planned to put an end to her as quickly as possible. She moved on to her target.

  In her plan, she had timed every movement, and had very little room for error or delay. She would depend on speed, brashness, and accuracy; she would do it alone.

  This time, she used the guard’s severed hand to get through heavier security, sliding aside a thick metal door to a windowless section. Yes, Haveeda must be in here. Laderna needed to hurry, finish her task, and be away. Afterward, she already knew how she would disappear.

  Inside the high-security section, she found herself in a small entrance foyer, with cubicles containing lab equipment, cleansuits, and protective magnifying goggles. At this late hour, no one was around—the maintenance woman’s schedules had been accurate. Inside, she expected to find one or more confinement cells for patients of the sanitarium, luxurious rooms for the highest-priority, wealthy but disturbed guests. One of them was the Diadem’s sister.

  She passed through a second doorway and heard a strange silence, an electronic barrier that dissolved when she touched an identity scanner. Inside, additional doors each had a control panel. Her pulse quickened as she went to the first one. The data image on the screen provided the patient’s name and brief personal history, but this was not the name she wanted. She kept moving from door to door until she found Haveeda Duchenet.

  This door had a simple manual mechanism that locked from the outside. Laderna had expected something more complex and secure; if Haveeda became violent she could probably have broken through the simple lock. Considering all the other precautions, Laderna found it a curious lapse.

  She pulled the door open to feel a blast of cold vapor, as if Haveeda’s room was highly refrigerated. Inside, she saw no distraught patient, no sleeping woman on a hospital bed, no well-appointed apartment … merely a sealed tank in the center of the room. Fascinated, she stepped over to it.

  With growing confusion, Laderna wiped sparkling frost from a curved observation panel, and to her surprise she saw a woman lying inside, preserved and frozen. Her eyes were open, staring straight up. It was the Diadem’s sister.

  She had expected to find Haveeda held as a prisoner, but not this! It was shocking, but nevertheless she had a job to do, an important accomplishment to impress Ishop. The problem was, how could she kill a person in suspended animation? Cutting off the medical monitors and life-preservation systems … not as dramatic an end as she had hoped for, but the result was what really mattered.

  She noticed a small access port on the side of the tank, as well as a pair of insulated gloves. She reached for the gloves, sure she could accomplish enough damage if she wrecked the life-support and monitoring systems. This was not a mission for subtlety; in order to make Ishop’s necessary point, others needed to know what had happened to Haveeda.

  Just as she reached inside the cryo-tank, she heard a noise behind her. Three guards burst into the room and tackled Laderna, slamming her to the floor.

  14

  While the walumps intrigued Enva Tazaar, anthropologists had apparently grown bored with them. The native creatures were enigmas, but at the end of the day, not all that interesting. Enva found it amusing that the creatures were so preoccupied with themselves, unaware of and uninterested in the tumultuous events out in the galaxy. It made them seem either enlightened or oblivious.

  On a day off from her clerical job, she took her easel and watercolor paint supplies she had purchase
d in town. A tribe of twenty walumps had built mud huts on the edge of the paved landing zone. Three nights previous, they had erected huts right in the middle of the pavement, but the administrator’s office—on Enva’s recommendation—dispatched dozers to knock them down and clear the area. Some dozer drivers yelled at the walumps, who paid no attention as their huts were destroyed. They simply rebuilt them the next night in the same place, and they were plowed down again the following day.…

  Enva dabbled with her watercolors to capture the walumps. The creatures shuffled in slow circles near their huts, but she couldn’t discern any particular interactions. Enva painted them, capturing their noble innocence, their primitivism. It was a good day.

  Enva had always fancied herself an artist. As the daughter of Lord Azio Tazaar, she’d had everything she could want, creating exotic aerogel sculptures. She liked the design and the curves, and played coy when critics asked her what the sculptures meant. Because of the power of her noble family, her aerogel sculptures had sold for high prices, and many lesser nobles showed their support for Lord Orsini by purchasing his daughter’s art.

  When Enva Tazaar took over the family fortunes and expanded Orsini wealth and influence, she’d donated one of the aerogel sculptures to the Sonjeera palace, part of her campaign of trying to convince old Michella that she, Enva, would be a better successor than the evil Black Lord.

  She had lost that gamble, though. Lost everything. And the fact that Enva now felt content to relax and paint, with no political purpose in mind, worried her. She didn’t want to disappear into obscurity. If she wasn’t careful, she might put her ambitions aside, make excuses for one delay or another.

  She needed to move further in her career in the administrator’s office, making herself not just excellent, but indispensable. For days, Karlo Reming had been agitated and intense, and she’d not seen him like this since she started to work as a meek functionary. The administrator had been conducting many private meetings and had asked her and Maruni Li to keep a tally of the space traffic to Tehila with a paranoid attention to detail. He took a particular interest in scheduling the normally lackluster crews that manned the two stringline terminus rings in orbit—one connected to the iperion route to the Hellhole hub, and the second, embargoed one, that went back to Sonjeera.