Firedance

by Steven Barnes

  Of course, the microsaur’s discomfort was nothing compared to what the giant saurians endured. For them, the control fence was a literal death strip. Nearing it caused unendurable pain. Crossing it detonated explosive charges built into their collars. Of course, there was a physical moat separating the Caernarvon from both garden and Menagerie.

  From time to time Tanaka could … hear things in the Menagerie. Rarely, very rarely, could he see anything—long before the big ones came into range of sight, their rudimentary brains were frying in pain. Most learned by the end of the first day. Only two had ever been decapitated. There was plenty of room in the outer Menagerie to roam, and mate … and hunt.

  Primarily the precautions were for the benefit of the smaller, more docile herbivores, but still …

  Tanaka pulled his thoughts back on track. Why the personal meeting? What business was there that might have motivated it? “We have received a proposition.” Tanaka ventured. “LucasCorp Ltd. is looking for a white knight, a buyer to protect them from being acquired by EuroFilm. They would prefer one of our corporations.”

  Swarna’s thick lips curled slightly. “And what would America think of me owning such a sacred possession? No. I will leave that.”

  Tanaka considered. What else was there that Swarna might take a personal interest in? Ah.

  “The rex has been sedated, and is en route to the Iron Mountain, sir.”

  That deepened Swarna’s smile. “Iron Mountain. They are mad, you know,” he said, but there was an affectionate wonder in his voice. “Quite mad. But their madness has kept them strong.”

  “The assagai have passed security, and can be mounted in the throne room, if you wish.”

  “The present from the Zulus. Twin fighting spears, in stainless steel, yes. Very nice.”

  “Sir. You must have something else on your mind, or I assume that you wouldn’t have suggested a personal meeting.”

  Swarna held a leaf between his fingers. The tiny dinosaur nibbled it gingerly, tasting. It ate with a delicacy that belied its awkward exterior. “The saboteur,” he said.

  “Kolia. At Swarnaville Spaceport.”

  “Yes.”

  “Working for the Americans—we think. Our mind probes revealed that Kolia was paid, and that he had a contact, but the timing was thrown off by the arrest. There was a street corner. A packet was to be exchanged, at exactly seven minutes past noon. It was impossible to break him in time to keep the appointment.”

  “We need … more effective methods,” Swarna said. He stooped, grimacing as his back creaked. Nevertheless he sighed happily, as if the sight and sensation of the tiny creature eating from his hand gave him a corresponding pleasure. “They have such small minds. They must be … cared for. Protected. Even from their own impulses.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Swarna gently scratched the microsaur’s head. It nuzzled the last piece of leaf from his hand, and then scurried back into the bushes.

  He stood and placed his hands at the small of his back, straightening his spine. “I want to know of the security arrangements.”

  “They are as full as I can make them, now, at this time. We must design equivalent security screens at each of two other possible locations. Disinformation. Unfortunate, but necessary.”

  The corners of Swarna’s mouth moved down a quarter of an inch. The rest of his face didn’t move. “Yes. Then we respond to this unfortunate incident in the standard fashion.”

  Tanaka was careful to keep his face neutral. “Kolia is only twelve years old, sir.”

  “Yes. No pain. Just kill him. And his father. And his brothers.”

  He smiled merrily, an ebon Father Christmas. “See to that. And stay for dinner, won’t you?”

  Tanaka’s black eyes were expressionless. Monster, you have purchased my services. I would die to protect you. My soul you cannot have.

  “Of course, sir,” he said. And bowed.

  3

  JULY 27. MANITOU SPRINGS, COLORADO.

  At 6:45 a.m. Aubry Knight awakened with a start, rousing himself from a dream of monstrous, angular buildings and predatory streets. In that dream he was an unborn child, floating within an eggshell. The egg rolled at the feet of two idiot, diapered infants who struggled for possession of an empty candy box, bawling out their mutual misery at hurricane decibel levels.

  He wiped his forehead, disoriented, eyes focusing on the blur of brown and green around him. The skimmer settled into its approach pattern. To either side of him were cliffs, hills, low mountain ranges. Below him was a silver-blue slip of river. More formidable crags crested the horizon. His navigator screen gave him a tiny red arrow traversing a web of blue contour lines. Sugarloaf Mountain appeared onscreen. Ahead somewhere was Manitou Springs Federal Training Facility.

  His skimmer dropped down into a primary approach path. Twice his guidance computer was challenged, warned that it was entering classified airspace. Codes had been requested and exchanged. Just ahead and below, Quonset huts glittered in the early-morning sun like a cluster of bubbles rising through mercury. As he swooped near, three bronze VTOLs leapt from the ground and flashed toward him.

  They hemmed him in, thick metallic wedges rimmed with pulsing strips of golden light. His control panel bleated protest, and then submission as they overrode his guidance system. Each security skimmer was twice the size of his personal travel pod. Here in their midst there was no turbulence and little sound.

  They shepherded him along as if he were a puppet suspended by invisible strings, and landed him with surgical precision. The skimmer’s hydraulics sighed as he settled to the landing pad. The metal superstructure sighed and creaked as it began to cool.

  The cockpit hissed open. Aubry smelled the air, scanned the mountains, and was hit by an almost overwhelming sense of déjà vu.

  A tall, gaunt woman in a metallic gray flight suit strode toward Aubry, hand outstretched. “Aubry Knight? Major Gagnon.” Her gaze was direct, open, and challenging. She had shoulder-length hair that was as bright and fine as spun gold. Her eyes were a bit too piercing, cheeks too severe and jawline too flat for her to be particularly photogenic, but she moved well, and spoke plainly. “I’ve heard of you, and look forward to working with you. You were trained by Guerrero, weren’t you?”

  A tickle of pleasure, tinged with regret, crept along Aubry’s back. He forgot about unpacking luggage, and met the major’s hard, flat hand with his own. Aubry liked her instantly. She waved him away from the luggage, and snapped her fingers for two junior noncoms to take the load. “Yes,” he said. Guerrero. “You knew him?”

  “Know him,” she said, her smile secretive.

  “You … what?” Aubry stopped, and stared at her.

  She laughed. “Not now. Later. STYX has a lot of secrets.”

  “STYX?”

  “Code name. You don’t need to know anything else about them. They want what you want.”

  “Which is?”

  “Phillipe Swarna, in a box. Now, we’ve got a tight schedule. Three weeks to teach you everything we can, and to refresh your memory.”

  “Why three weeks?”

  “We may have more time, but we don’t dare bet that way. There’s a merchant route that’s still sterile, but Swarna has a fuck-all intelligence network. He’s using NipTech, natch.” She sounded wistful. “We really shouldn’t have blown that. Anyway, we have three different routes set up—but have to wait for additional confirmation before we make a commitment.”

  “All right, three weeks.”

  “Of course, we won’t have to drill you on the unarmed. They say Colonel Kim is angry about that.”

  “Kim? Who is that?”

  “Counterinsurgency expert. He coordinates a lot of the combat schooling for American intelligence. Created the Night Tigers unit. Almost as good as Gorgon. He insisted on having you go through his training, came out here personally to supervise it. We have to disappoint him.”

  “I guess we can work out, if you want.”

&
nbsp; Gagnon’s golden hair bounced as she shook her head. The gesture softened but failed to offset the severity of her face. “You don’t understand. He’s heard your rep. Let’s leave it alone. A broken arm or fractured kneecap for you right now would throw everything off schedule. We can’t afford it.”

  Aubry thought about that for a minute. “You think he’s that good?”

  “He’s magic. Leave it.”

  “All right.”

  “All right. Firearms, infiltration, we have to set up a communications link with you. Implant your linguistics. Instant polyglot. We can promise you the most intense twenty-one days of your entire life. Guerrero says you’re the fastest study that he ever met. You’d better be. And something else, too.”

  “What?”

  She led him toward a low building shaped like a reverse L that had fallen onto its side. “Lucky,” she said. “You had better be the luckiest man God ever let live. Phillipe Swarna is probably the hardest target on Earth. It’ll take a touch of magic to get him.”

  4

  Aubry’s room was at the farthest end of a quiet corridor, at the end of a nested series of security gates. His thumbprint and voice opened the door. The room wasn’t much larger than a cell. It held a shower cubicle, a commode, and a hard bunk. There was enough room on the floor for him to perform his morning exercises. A single window set opposite the bed was polarized blue. He ran his finger along the bottom, clearing it.

  Snow-crested mountains clustered beyond Aubry’s barracks window, jagged as splintered teeth. Beneath them sat the landing field, where wedge-shaped security craft dipped and lifted with metronomic regularity. He ran his finger along the vertical polarizing strip. Purple ghosts swarmed, devouring the light.

  The cot creaked protest as he lay back, listening to the distant sounds. He struggled to distinguish voices and familiar noises. He needed to absorb the base’s rhythms. He folded his hand together and slipped them behind his head. Little to do now, except be ready. Easy enough: I was born ready. I’ll die ready. He grinned at the cliché.

  And yet, there was a part of him that really, truly didn’t care if he lived or died. It was a tiny spot, and he did not try to banish it. It was another tool. Within every human heart was an incredible range of emotions, from nurturing healer to psychopathic berserker. Each, in its proper circumstance, was appropriate.

  Care too much about living, and you will die. This he had learned the hard way. So accept the inevitable—but do not seek it. Hope only that before that final hour comes, you can discharge all obligations. Beyond that, no man could do.

  What had Jenna said?

  “There are few things in life that matter, Aubry. There is knowledge. There is honor. There is family. Unless it benefits one of these three, what is the use of it?”

  “What about pleasure?” he had asked.

  “Don’t seek pleasure. Seek knowledge, and honor. Protect and nurture your family. Pleasure will find you.”

  5

  At 10:30, Major Gagnon escorted Aubry to the mess hall. Nine-tenths of the training complex was underground, or embedded in the mountain. No natural light shone into the room. In some ways it reminded him of Death Valley Maximum Security Prison, a genuinely scrotum-tautening association.

  They filed through the mess line and found seating in a corner of the room. The major ate with a quiet fervor, her eyes sweeping the room like a lighthouse beacon brushing back the night.

  Aubry ate in silence, absorbing himself in the task of slicing barbecued beef into strips. He inserted the fork tines between the grain, lifted it to his mouth and chewed slowly, extracting the juice before he swallowed. The room buzzed with unfocused conversation, general talk. Slowly, as if at a prearranged signal, the conversations died to a murmur.

  A pale man with straight yellow hair and a crew cut rose from a table across from him and sauntered over. The man was built like an inverted pyramid, with narrow hips, and shoulders at least two inches wider than Aubry’s. Stupefying pectoral development bulged an electric blue tank top. Deep networks of wrinkles radiated from the corners of his light gray eyes. It was difficult to determine the age—face and neck suggested fifties. The man walked with eerie grace, his weight carried slightly forward, high in his chest.

  A trancelike silence descended upon the room.

  The combat computer in Aubry’s head automatically judged and evaluated: tae kwon do, or one of the other kicking arts. Hwa rang do, maybe. Korean styles. Kim is angry about that. One of the colonel’s boys? His hands were callused, so he wasn’t a kickboxer …

  The man leaned over the table and cocked his head sideways. He reeked of animal challenge.

  “Hey, Knight,” Pecs said, not unpleasantly. “You were number eleven. Would have been the next to actually ride the torch, wouldn’t you?”

  “There were problems.” Aubry chewed his food easily, steadily. One careful bite at a time. There was an eternity between mouthfuls. All the fucking time in the world.

  “Yeah.” Pecs was enjoying himself. “Well—all of the scandals hit right after that anyway. Whole Nullboxing thing is fake, isn’t it? Like pro wrestling?”

  Aubry flinched. Damn. “There might have been cheating. I don’t know—I wasn’t a part of it. They were still good, damned good.”

  “You think those techniques work against a real man?”

  Aubry smiled thinly. “I think so. I’ve used them once or twice, with a little success.”

  “I was sorry to hear that you’re not going to work out with us. Colonel Kim was disappointed.” He laid one massive hand on Aubry’s shoulder and squeezed. It wasn’t hostile, more a subtle evaluation of the muscle density and striation. He peered into the depths of Aubry’s eyes, into the cave, searching for the animal.

  At first, Aubry just smiled coldly. Then he picked up a knife with his right hand. The table cutlery was heavy, institutional steel. He rolled the handle between his palms until it began to warm.

  “There is something you want to know. This lesson is free.” Aubry paused for emphasis. “The next one costs.”

  Aubry wound his fingers around the haft. Second, fourth, and little fingers were on top, the third finger underneath.

  The room was more than silent now. It seemed frozen, with every eye on the two men. One stood, the other sat. Aubry focused on the knife handle. A dark tunnel of concentration surrounded it, so that the rest of the world ceased to exist.

  He contracted his fist. A roaring filled his ears. His shirt sleeve suddenly filled, as every muscle and cord in his forearm swelled. For two full seconds nothing happened. Aubry watched the knife as if it were held in someone else’s hand and he were merely an intensely interested observer.

  Then slowly, smoothly, the haft bent ninety degrees.

  “Shit.” Gagnon almost choked on her brisket of beef.

  Aubry handed it to Pecs. “Here,” he said. “A present.”

  The karate man looked at Aubry for a moment. He rubbed his stubbled chin thoughtfully, then broke out into a grin. “You are all fucking right.” He held out a meaty hand. “François Belloc. Good to have you here.”

  Aubry shook it, felt the power and knew the man at once. In terms of raw contractile tissue, Belloc had greater physical potential than Aubry, but only a fraction of the mental focus. Still, François Belloc would be tremendously fast, and skilled, and tenacious, with an insane tolerance for pain.

  And both of them knew that Aubry would kill him in under ten seconds. Despite that unspoken knowledge, François was damn near wagging an invisible tail.

  François almost wiggled with delight. “Swear to God, man. Kim is gonna have a kitten.”

  “Meow,” Aubry said, and continued his meal.

  6

  The long, low-ceilinged room was darkened. Three cones of light projected down onto as many chairs, grouped at one end of a long, rectangular conference table. Aubry Knight, Major Gagnon, and General Koskotas sat. Behind Koskotas stood the silent Kramer. These four were the only huma
n beings, but in the middle of the room hovered a relief map of Central Africa so vivid it seemed a living presence. No matter where in the room you sat, the map faced you. In the middle of the map, a landmass was marked out in dark red, like a bloated spider crouching in the middle of the continent.

  “This is PanAfrica,” Gagnon said. “It is ruled by two forces: the Yakuza Divine Blossom keiretsu, and the man known as Phillippe Swarna. Swarna is the greater power, but there is tension between them. That tension is the key to our plan.

  “We don’t merely want to kill Swarna—we want to make it appear that Divine Blossom is responsible. If and when we do this, it will destroy the partnership. All the king’s horses and all the king’s men will eat omelets for a month. The United States will be the only power the PanAfricans can turn to. The distraction will also allow you to …” Gagnon paused. “To be completely honest, I should say ‘will increase your chances of’ escape. Every step is crucial, because of Swarna’s penetration of our security apparatus.”

  Aubry didn’t like the sound of that one bit. “How severe is it?”

  “In the past year, we’ve uncovered something frightening.” Even in the dim light, Aubry could tell that Gagnon had flushed with discomfort. “We’ve had to come up with a new word for what he did to us. We call it Versa. Understand something—we can’t manufacture all of the components necessary for our security systems. Millions of memory bubbles come from Europe, millions more from Japan. Literally billions of lines of code go into a single major defense network. Much of that is farmed out to contractors around the world.

  “There is no way to keep total control of all of it. We try. Well, somewhere, with one of our suppliers, or one of our programmers, something went wrong. Someone slipped in a time bomb. One chip, one chip among millions, with a few lines of altered code. It got past us.

  “The time bomb, which we call Versa, created a virtual rom. It read the original and created a new one—like a computer within the computer. It used partitioning techniques much more sophisticated than anything we have. It invisibly compressed and restored data, doubled our storage space. We never had a clue. At that point, everything we did went into the ‘virtual machine,’ get it?”