by Wren, M. K.
Alex looked over at Jael. “Any new developments at the main HQ?”
“Nothing important. I talked to our HS chief today. You can scan the tapes later.”
“Then I think that concludes our business. We can turn to more civilized subjects now, and perhaps a more civilized custom—such as dining. Amik, are you going to let your guests expire from starvation?”
Amik laughed, grunting as he pulled himself to his feet.
“Never let it be said that a guest in the house of Amik went hungry. So. We’ll retire to the dining room, but with one stipulation: I won’t have my digestion upset with talk of business or problems of any sort.”
Alex rose, nodding acquiescence. “You have my word. Nothing but the most civilized conversation.”
“I’ll hold that in faith, friend.”
Amik’s stipulation was met, and for a full two hours the meal was uninterrupted by anything that might conceivably upset his digestion. It was only when the attentive servants were serving the caffay that Alex heard the buzz of his pocketcom.
He shrugged helplessly at Amik’s disgruntled sigh.
“My apologies to my gracious host,” he said as he rose. “I hope the interruption will be brief. Excuse me.”
Amik waved him away. “Go with! I should be satisfied with so long a time as this in peace.”
Alex put the ’com on hold until he was in the salon with the drapes pulled between him and the dining room. There was no image when he flipped the ’com open; the call was probably from Fina relayed through the COS HQ comcenter.
“Ransom on line.”
“Alex, are you clear?” It was Ben Venturi.
“Yes. Where are you?”
“Fina, but I’m transing to the Cave as soon as I can get to the MT room.”
There was an undercurrent of excitement in his voice, and Alex felt his pulse quicken.
“Ben, what is it?”
“Thank the God and say a couple of prayers that I’m right—I think I’ve found Andreas. We’ll have to get an agent in for positive ident, but every piece of information fits. Alex, I’ll stake my life on it. We’ve found him.”
“Where—no, wait.” He took a deep breath, bringing his mind and body under tight rein. “Jael and I will meet you at the COS HQ. Ten minutes.”
He didn’t wait for Ben’s response, but snapped the ’com shut as he strode to the drapes and pushed them back.
“Jael, we have to get back to the Cave.”
Jael rose, black eyes intent, and after a moment a tight smile pulled at his lips.
“Finally,” he said.
Alex didn’t take time to wonder how Jael read the truth in his face.
Finally, indeed.
2.
Mike Compton was manning the MT console at the COS HQ. He cocked his thumb in the direction of the conference room, and Alex crossed the stone floor, Jael keeping pace with him, both too preoccupied even to scan the monitoring screens. In the conference room, Ben had a portable reading screen set up on the table. He rose, offering a hand, his rugged features home for a smile that seemed a stranger there.
“Alex, how was your research expedition?”
Alex laughed; Ben still referred to his work among the Shepherds as “research.”
“It was a propaganda mission, but informative.” His smile faded as he studied Ben’s face; he still hadn’t regained his color or all the weight lost during his recovery from the laser wound. “How are you, Ben?”
“I’m too damned relieved to feel anything but great. Jael, you look fit as a Lord—and dressed for the part.”
Jael smiled crookedly as he moved around to study the image on the screen.
“Oh, I’m fit enough, Ben, but I thought I was off the line for the night. What’s come down on Andreas?”
Ben seated himself in front of the screen, and Alex, looking over his shoulder, saw an aerial view of what seemed to be a Confleet base. From the landscape and ’bubbles, he guessed it to be on Castor.
Ben said, “If I haven’t gone clear over the edge, this is where we’ll find Andreas. Pendino. It’s a small base; Class C. Damn, there are ten thousand like it in the Two Systems. Pendino’s a repair depot, mainly, but they have a small active fleet. It’s about twenty-five hundred kilometers northwest of Helen.” His hand went to the controls, and a series of images flickered across the screen until he stopped at a map with Helen in the center. “Here—in the middle of this open patch of the Barrens between the Troyan and Polyon Mountains. The only civilization closer than Helen is a few Eliseer mine complexes in the mountains.” Then he switched back to the aerial view of the base. “I’ll give somebody credit—a Class C Confleet base is the last place I’d look for Andreas. Almost the last place I did look. I didn’t expect the SSB masterminds to run the risk; the detention centers are so short on security systems. But it was worth the risk just because we didn’t expect it. Besides, keeping him on Castor meant less transportation; they knew our best chance of getting a lead on him was in transit. I think the only reason they moved him off Pollux was to make us think he was on his way to Terra. We almost took that bait, too.”
Alex gazed at the screen, the image layered with the images of memory. Andreas Riis with his aesthete’s face, his probing eyes, and that pervading gentleness that had been his undoing. Andreas was somewhere in that complex of slab-like buildings and mushroom hangars. At least, he might be.
“What led you to Pendino, Ben?”
He leaned back, turning his palms up. “That’s a long story, but the key was the psychocontrollers. We knew they’d call in the best to work on Andreas’s TAB, so we’ve been tracing the movements of the top SSB PCs. Of course, they covered their tracks damn well, but we finally caught enough leaks to realize there’d been an unusual number of ranking PCs visiting Pendino in the last eight months, so we took a closer look at it.”
Alex shifted his gaze to Ben, almost reluctant to take his eyes from the stark scene.
“But you don’t have positive identification yet?”
“No imagraphs or VPs, but I got a look at the DC files—and nearly lost one of our best agents in FleetComm. Anyway, one prisoner hits you right between the eyes. Prisoner number 10-273. Confleet DCs are generally used for ’Fleeter disciplinary problems until they see the error of their ways or sober up. That usually means a few days or weeks at the most. But 10-273 has been in for eight months. He was registered two days after Andreas was arrested. Then I saw a medical requisition for 10-273 for copadine. It’s an anticoagulant: not something the average ’Fleeter would take. Erica says Andreas has used it for years; that or similar drugs. The number 10-273 is interesting, too. Conpol, Confleet, and the SSB all have a code system for classifying their prisoners.”
Alex nodded. “The first two numbers are the key, aren’t they?”
“Right. All SSB prisoners start with one, Conpol with two, Confleet with three. The second number refers to classifications within each of those categories; the other numbers are codes used by individual DCs. All Phoenix prisoners come under SSB jurisdiction, so 10-273 begins well enough with that one, but the number one-zero doesn’t mean a damn thing. The SSB has no classification for it. Phoenix prisoners are all classified one-seven. But they knew we’d be looking for that, and I think to keep from fouling up their computers, they put Andreas in a class by himself.”
“Very perceptive of them.” Alex stared mesmerized at the screen, and some part of him wanted to laugh aloud, but it was only evident in a slight lift in his voice. “Ben, I can’t believe you’re wrong—probably because I don’t want to—but we’ll still need positive ident. Do you have a layout of the DC?”
Ben nodded and flipped through another series of images, then stopped at a floor plan.
“This is Level 1 of the base HQ. It’s underground, and most of i
t’s used for storage and maintenance. The water cyclers are up here, power exchange here, equipment storage in this area. He brought the image up and shifted it to put one section in the center of the screen. “This is the base DC.”
On the right edge of the screen a corridor ran north and south; from the wider view, Alex knew it was the main access corridor for the entire level. In the center of the screen a hallway branched to the left off the main corridor, forming a horizontal “T.” Against the wall of the main corridor, across from the second hall, a square was drawn with the initials MS inscribed in it. Monitoring station.
The side hall led to a large circular area; a smaller circle was drawn just inside the outer perimeter, with radiating lines connecting the two. Alex felt a chill. Even after seven months, the memories of the Cliff were bitterly clear. The spaces enclosed within those lines represented cells. There were twenty of them around the circle.
In the center of the circle was another small square with the initials MS. A guard stationed there could see into every cell, and vidicams within the cells would give him even more detailed readings. Dotted lines crossed the openings of each cell: shock screens. Across the hall leading to the main corridor was another dotted line.
“We have two monitoring stations to contend with,” Ben was saying, his blunt finger moving across the screen. “This one in the main corridor, and the one in the DC. The corridor station picks up the signals from the DC station; that gives them backup. The guards at either one of the stations can activate the shock screens on the cells and this one in the hall, and they both have alarm switches. With a lot of luck, you’d have maybe thirty seconds before reinforcements arrived if somebody hit the alarms.”
Jael frowned absently at the layout. “What about access from the upper levels?”
Ben pulled back again to show the entire level.
“There are five nulgrav lifts along the main corridor. The closest to the DC is here—that’s about fifteen meters south of the corridor monitoring station.”
Alex began pacing the room, hands clasped behind his back. “Our first problem is positive identification. Then we can worry about access.”
Ben nodded. “We’ll have to get someone inside the DC. I’ve dug as deep as I can. There isn’t an imagraph or VP ident on prisoner 10-273 in the Pendino files, and definitely no interrogation tapes we could use for VP comparison. The SSB file on Andreas is sealed so tight, I’m not sure if even Galinin could touch it.”
“We can’t risk sending an agent into the DC. One hint that we’re that close and they’d have Andreas out of there before we could do a damn thing about it. We’d be right back where we started.”
“I know, Alex, but we can’t risk going in without positive ident, either.”
“We’ll go in once, and only once—when we go in for Andreas.” He leaned over Ben’s shoulder to reach the controls, pulling the image up until only the DC was visible. “All Confleet bases operate on Terran Standard Time; they have three shift changes a day. There are six men in Pendino who have the answer to our question; six men who see prisoner 10-273 every day.” He pointed to each of the two monitoring stations in turn. “I want one out of six. That shouldn’t be too difficult.”
Ben nodded. “If we can get hold of one of the guards, Erica can work on him and get an ident from imagraphs. Then we send him back to Pendino with memory blocks, and he’ll never know he’s been aiding and abetting.”
Alex turned away from the screen to resume his pacing.
“Nor will the SSB, and we may find the same method useful in freeing Andreas—once we’re sure he’s there. The guards at those monitoring stations are the keys.”
“I hope to hell we can get two nonresistants on the same shift.”
Alex shrugged. “Confleet attracts nonresistants, even susceptibles. First, we have to capture just one of those guards.”
“Helen is the closest city to Pendino,” Jael put in. “A lot of Pendino ’Fleeters spend their leaves there, and most of them end up in the Outside sooner or later. If we can box one of these six in the Outside, he’ll be a kid’s gim to pull down.”
“We’ll pull him down,” Ben said firmly, “one way or another, but that’s a good line to follow up.” Then he added, “If we don’t get tangled up with the Brothers.”
“You won’t if you let me handle the catch.”
“Fine with me.” Ben switched off the screen and removed the tape spool. “I’ll have to get copies of Pendino’s personnel files and leave schedules. That’ll take a few days, then maybe we’ll have something we can get our teeth into.”
Alex paused in his restless pacing. “You’d better go over the personnel files with Erica. She can suggest the best candidates for conditioning, in case we have a choice.”
“Alex, I hardly make a move these days without an expert opinion from her. I guess there’s nothing more we can do now. I’ll get back to Fina and start the wheels turning on the files. By the way, Erica sends her regards, Alex, and she wants a detailed report on your tour. Verbal, and as soon as possible; she says she likes her impressions fresh. Besides, she was jumpy as a cat the whole time you were gone.”
“She needn’t have been,” he said absently, “I was set up for MT trans to Phoenix One at any time.”
“Well, she worries a lot, especially when you’re wandering around Cameroodo or Selasid compounds. She calls them time bombs.”
Alex took a quick breath, frowning. “She’s right about that. I’ll call her as soon as I can. How is she?”
Ben slumped back into his chair, arms folded.
“She’s all right, and we haven’t had so much as a hard look from Predis lately. He got a negative reaction when he sent his boys after me. I think if everybody wasn’t so caught up in the war fever, that would’ve laid the whole thing wide open. But it’s working, Alex, the war fever’s working. He had another one of those rallies a couple of days ago and pulled over four thousand members. That’s nearly everybody in Fina who wasn’t on essential duty. The way they were cheering, you’d think they’d already won his damned war.”
Alex nodded, but he didn’t feel the old numb rage; they would—might—have Andreas free soon. And the LR-MT.
He turned to Jael. “Have you talked to Lyden or Bruce lately?”
“Lyden. He wants to see you. He says they’re on a new tangent and they have some promising read-outs. I think that means they’re closer to lining in on the tangent Andreas was taking. As far as I’m concerned, Lyden’s in the Beyond. I don’t speak the language.”
“Neither do I, and talking to him usually doesn’t help any. Damn, Andreas was so close. Along with everything else, we’ve lost eight months on the LR-MT, and I doubt we’ll have time to make it up.”
Ben frowned at him. “What do you mean? Predis?”
Alex hesitated before he answered. “He’s only part of it. I told you my tour was informative. Ben, the Concord’s going to see some uprisings in the next few months to make the ones in the past look like children’s games. Cameroodo. Both the Lamb’s and the Brother’s influence there is virtually nonexistent because the Shepherds are so weak. Lord James likes to keep them in their place. The Toramil compounds are going to explode, and when they do it’ll be a real disaster. Like the Ganymede uprising. It’s always more dangerous where you have habitat systems.”
Neither Ben nor Jael responded to that, and Alex felt the uneasiness in their silence. He looked over at Ben with an oblique smile.
“Sorry. This is no time for gloom-casting when we might have Andreas free soon.”
Ben laughed as he came to his feet. “If I got discouraged with a little gloom, I’d have gone over the edge long ago. Jael, tell Val I wish her luck at Saint Petra’s. You have her set up for emergency trans?”
“She’s well screened on every side. Don’t worry.” He smiled faintly.
“We almost lost her once. If we lose her on this gim, we can’t send the hounds after her. Not into Saint Petra’s. Alex, if you don’t need me here for a while, I’ll go back to the old Ser’s for Val. She’ll be wondering what’s come down.”
“Go ahead, and I won’t need either of you tonight, so you can both relax.”
“Thanks.” Jael touched the doorcon and as the screens clicked off turned to Ben. “If we’re going to cage one of those guards in the Outside, I’ll need a little running time to set it up.”
“You’ll have it. Alex, get some rest. We may be too busy to sleep the next few weeks.”
“I’d give up more than sleep to have Andreas free. That’s worth any price asked.”
Jael frowned. “Brother, you’re asking fate.”
“Probably. Ben, thanks for the good news.”
“Feels damn good, doesn’t it? Later. . . .”
Alex watched Ben cross to the MT, a vigor in his stride that had been absent for a long time.
Hope, Alex thought; that ambivalent blessing.
He walked with Jael as far as the bank of monitors and scanners. Even their tickings and hummings seemed to have a more positive pitch, and the faces of the monitoring crew reflected hopeful anticipation.
“Jael, I’ll talk to you and Val in the morning.” Then, after Jael had gone on to the MT, Alex turned to one of the comtechs.
“Mistra Rosiv, will you call a general assembly here in the comcenter. I have some news for the staff.”
3.
Master Bruno Hawkwood listened to the soft chunking of his hoe, guiding the primitive tool with intent concentration, carefully skirting the clusters of flowers around the base of the tree.
Daffodils. They seemed incongruous on this desert planet, but at Saint Petra’s a place had been made for them, a place where Terran things thrived, and in the controlled sunlight enjoyed an eternal spring. The graceful notes of bird songs emerged from the green shadows of the trees, lending a pastoral calm to the afternoon. His hoe moved in rhythmic strokes, turning the soil, cutting out the straying grass. The daffodils had a peculiarly heady fragrance, more like Terran narcissus. It reminded him of Margreta; narcissus was her favorite flower because of that sweet fragrance. With the fading of her vision, she’d learned to cultivate the pleasures of other senses.
