Fellowship Fantastic

by Greenberg, Martin H.

  Go. Now. The instinct screamed. The impossible crushed look on his face said it all. Adrenaline surged and muscles hurt with the need to move. Then Kevin leaned back from the bartender with a glass of water.

  Scott’s face went diplomat blank. Eyes half-shuttering, mouth softening, he turned to the investigator.

  If he looked back in her direction, Gilly didn’t know. She was long gone.

  He tried to control the circling, repetitious thoughts with each step. He sucked in a breath and continued down the hall of the residences to the lift.

  Interesting, really, that when he was confused, he always went to the one person whose mind he couldn’t read. She always calmed his confusion. Now she was the confusion, where did he go?

  Between his own interview and Kevin’s evening drink, Chol had shared his suspicions with his junior. They’d interviewed a few other individuals. Puzzle pieces were aligning.

  Interesting what a large puzzle piece he himself was.

  Used, used, used. He slammed down a mental door. Stop.

  Reaching the end of the hall, he called the lift. Rode up to her level counting his breaths.

  He stared at her door, not even remembering walking down the hall. Finally he lifted his hand and knocked.

  The knock stopped Gilly in the midst of sorting essentials from dross. Stepping to one side of the door she lifted the small multispecies tranq gun she carried on her sideline jobs, and adjusted her thumb on the species-selector. “Yes?”

  “It’s me.”

  “Come.” She lowered the gun and touched off the door lock.

  He entered and the door slid shut behind him, lock reactivating automatically. He glanced around her living room, then at the gun. She didn’t speak, just slipped it back into her belt. “Well. That answers . . . that.”

  “You didn’t even need to ask. I saw your face. Whatever you got off him in the bar . . . it was all you needed.” She met his eyes squarely. She wouldn’t apologize, dammit. She wouldn’t apologize for who she was.

  He nodded. “You’re right. This . . . Chol . . . is good at his job. He’s got what he needs, too. He’s got a lot of the pieces. It’s all very convincing. Of all the beings connected to the missions with leaks, he traced the pattern. He laid it all out for Kevin this afternoon. It was right at the top of Kevin’s mind, in the bar. Even if you weren’t flying a mission, I was on it—” His voice cracked. He looked away.

  She swallowed hard. Not apologizing for who she was didn’t mean not feeling like slime. It just meant keeping it on the inside. Bluff it out, Gedrick.

  “So what are you here for? Turn me in?” Scott’s moral code and her efforts to bend it might be a longstanding joke, but she knew his sense of honor. She’d expected to have a lot longer to buff the shine off of it before easing him into her way of life. This was too soon. The information came too suddenly, from an external source. She knew him well enough to know that he’d think turning her in could be considered for her own good. Which was why the tranq gun was currently default set on human.

  “Thought about it.” He shook his head. “Couldn’t even entertain the thought seriously. You should know that, but you don’t, and that’s part of the problem.” She blinked, confused, but he kept talking so she kept listening. “I’m here to tell you Ghyad wants an airtight case, and you’ve got two days before he closes on you.” He looked at the sorted piles. “Not that it looks like you need them. Already on your way?”

  “Actually, no. Just some contingency preparations.” Her mouth twisted. “I wasn’t going to leave without seeing you.”

  “Really.” He didn’t sound convinced. “Well. Here I am. They’ll complete the interviews tomorrow. His aide is gathering the systems data. Records of flight paths, ships taken out, time logs, personnel logs, etc. They’ll call you in on the second day and spring the trap, but they’re going to quietly start curtailing diplomatic travel before then. For all Kevin is a nice, fair guy, Chol has him convinced.”

  “That would be because I am, in fact, guilty.”

  “Yes, I suppose that would be why. Anyway, that’s why I’m here. To . . . warn you.” Scott’s face suddenly looked pained. “Help you get out while you can. You can, right?”

  “I’ll file my resignation electronically in the morning. I can be off-station on the first transport and no one can stop me. Just another traveler . . . not a diplomatic employee.” She forced a smile. “Why help?”

  “What are friends for?” he said mechanically.

  She tried to say thank you. What came out was, “If it’s any consolation, it’s just what we do.”

  “What?”

  “My family. It’s not personal. It’s just how we survive, how we live. We find angles and we play them. It’s why I told you that you’d never meet my dad. Why I’d never introduce you. He’s a career criminal. That’s why I came to fly for the Corps. The chance to deal in information.”

  His brows drew in, confused. “Why would I find that consolation?”

  “I don’t . . . know. It seems like that’s what people say. That bit about consolation.”

  He huffed out a dry laugh. “You’re not very good at this friendship thing, are you?”

  “On the whole, no.” She rubbed the bridge of her nose. “I thought I was getting pretty good at it, with you.”

  “Except for the whole using me for information you were selling off to the highest bidder thing.”

  “I wasn’t just using you for information.”

  He looked skeptical. “No?”

  “No.” She shot him an affronted glare. “I use lots of people for information. Everyone. I don’t get to know them. I don’t talk to them. Not the way I do you. I don’t tell them about my father.” She ran a hand through her hair. “You’re different. As much as I tried not to let you be. I don’t want to leave you here.”

  “You don’t have a choice. You have to leave.”

  “Oh, I know I have to leave.”

  “Then what . . . oh. Oh no.” He held up both hands. “I don’t know what you’re thinking, but no. Let’s recall I just found out that the person I trusted most in the world because I couldn’t read her mind was using me to steal diplomatic secrets and sell them. Effectively making me a traitor to my own government.” He backed up a step, a habit Gilly found incredibly cute, given her diminutive size.

  Hands on her hips, she advanced on him. “Think about it. You don’t even like your work. They don’t listen to you. And you’re always right. Because you’ve got the edge. I listen to you. I know you’re right, because I know about the edge. You and me . . . in business together. I’ve got the money, almost all I need for a ship of my own. That’s what I’ve been working toward, that’s why I’ve been selling the information. Come in with me! I’ve always been planning to ask you in, I just wanted to wait until I could . . . get you a little more unbent. A little less spit and polish, a little more flexible. A little more scruffed-up around the edges. More willing to play both sides against the middle. But . . . OK . . . so here we are. We’re at the crossroads and now’s the time. You and me, a team. You can relax around me. You can be you. The real you. You don’t have to hide and pretend. That’s the point, Ash. That’s real friendship. You did trust me. You had to trust me the same way the rest of humanity has to do it, without the telepathic edge. You got burned because you couldn’t see it all in me, the way you do with everyone else. And yes, I suck. I have situational ethics, and I used them on you. Although, to be fair, have I ever lied to you about having situational ethics?”

  His brows furrowed. “Well . . . no.”

  “Have I ever once implied to you that I’m loyal to our dear Assembly, or even worse, to Earth?”

  He laughed outright. “Emphatically not.”

  “Scott. I’m sorry. I honestly am. I didn’t think I would be, but . . . when you looked at me, in the bar, I wished it could have been different.”

  His laughter died. His hand cupped her chin and lifted it, guiding her eyes ba
ck to his. The sadness on his face cracked something in her chest. “I’m sorry, too,” he whispered. “I can’t just . . . leave. This is all I know. All I am.” He pulled her into a hug.

  “And this is all I am,” she whispered into his chest.

  Chol slammed the door to Wedderburn’s office behind Scott, pointing him to a chair. Scott jumped at the sound. Someone was pissed off.

  Kevin sat calmly beside Wedderburn, who mopped at his forehead with a white handkerchief. Jaane sat to the left of Chol’s chair with a data screen in front of her. In a sunny yellow pantsuit, she looked absolutely stunning, but when Chol stalked around to the front of Scott’s chair, he eclipsed the view. Chol leaned forward, hands on the arms of the chair, claws fully extended and puncturing the leather.

  “Junior Diplomat Ashford.” The voice remained husky, but the glacial tone made Scott shiver. “You’re good friends with Pilot Gillian Gedrick.”

  “Yes.”

  Lavender lips drew into a tight line. “I assume you’re aware Pilot Gedrick resigned this morning.”

  Scott tried for pure shock. “I . . . no!”

  “Where is she?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Suddenly the investigator stood, towering in front of Scott’s chair. After a moment of total silence, his spoke softly. “You remember, Mr. Ashford, my mentioning to Senior Wedderburn that you would go far in the Corps. You would be amazed at the influence a word from the Investigations Sector has over advancements of that nature.”

  You’ll be the youngest ambassador since Kraiger. Your parents will be thrilled. Just make sure you’ll be thrilled, too. He stared up at the preternaturally still investigator, then stood up. To his surprise, he found himself eye to eye with Chol. Somehow the Mor seemed . . . taller. “Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised. However, that information would be much more meaningful to me if I were still employed by the Diplomatic Corps.” Reaching into his pocket, he extracted the disk containing his letter of resignation and tossed it at Wedderburn, then stepped sideways, turned on his heel, and left.

  Gilly shouldered the pack more comfortably. She wasn’t going to miss the Corps. She was off to buy her own ship. So the miasma of depressing thoughts could just bugger off anytime, dammit. She yanked her hat on more firmly as a pair of security officers strolled by.

  Settling down in a seat to wait for her transport to be called, she propped her feet on her bags and wished she’d just stolen a hopper. But that could have gotten Deb in trouble. Bad enough she’d be leaving Ash in a wash of suspicion. She’d tried to warn him, but he’d insisted on staying.

  Why would he go with her, after all?

  A large body dropped into the chair right next to her, despite multiple seats being open. She rolled her eyes.

  “You move damn fast for having such short legs.”

  Her head jerked around. “What are you doing here?”

  He looked ridiculous in some sort of fashionable, bright yellow glasses/visor combo, his hair gelled into spikes, but she had to grant he didn’t look anything like Junior Diplomat Scott Ashford. He smiled and hugged his pack to his chest. “Taking a friend’s advice. Turns out she was right about a few things. Like lingering suspicion by association. Investigator Ghyad made it clear that since I couldn’t provide him with your location, I could expect to become the oldest living Junior Diplomat on record.”

  “Dammit, Ash, I’m sorry.” She took a deep breath and stared at her packs, then reached out and gripped his hand. “We’ll go back.” The minute the words were out of her mouth, the rock in her stomach dissolved. The tension eating at her shoulders relaxed. Her resolve firmed. Righteous anger stirred in her gut. “They’re not going to do this to you. They can’t, not if they’ve got me. The most you’re guilty of is talking about diplomatic matters with other Corps employees and damned if everyone doesn’t do that. If you don’t come out of it with nothing more than a reprimand, I’ll eat that idiotic visor you’re—” She started to rise, grabbing her shoulder pack.

  His hand closed around her wrist, yanking her back into her seat. His face glowed behind the glasses. “Gil . . . ” He shook his head. “I don’t even know what to say.”

  “Don’t bother. Save it for Chol.” She tried to rise again, but this time he held her fast. “Seriously, the sooner we start the proceedings the—”

  He shook his head. “We don’t want to miss our transport.” He jerked his head at the screen above them, running rapidly with numbers, times, and destinations. “Where are we headed? I just bought an outgoing and figured I could add on when we boarded.”

  She glared. “Back to Sector Central. Now. Move your ass.”

  “You didn’t let me finish telling you about the advice I took from this friend of mine. She also told me to be careful about accepting funny hats unless I really wanted them.”

  Gilly stared. “You aren’t serious—”

  “Can I tell you something?” he whispered. At her slow nod, he leaned a little closer. “I hate the Diplomatic Corps.”

  “You’re coming into business with me?”

  “On one condition.”

  “Only one?”

  “One I can think of right now.”

  “And that is?”

  “That you never under any circumstances try to make me sleep with anyone for information ever again.”

  “Even if he or she is incredibly sexy?”

  “Even if.”

  “Ashford, you have the weirdest moral code of anyone I’ve ever met.”

  “At least I have one.”

  “I have a moral code!”

  “. . .”

  “I do!”

  “And we’ll be developing that as we develop a code of ethics for our business.”

  “Ash?”

  “Yes?”

  “Let me give you a little friendly advice . . .”

  About the Authors

  Brad Beaulieu likes writing both short and novel-length fiction. His first sale of any kind was to the Deep Magic online zine in the summer of 2004. His first professional sale was “Flotsam,” which won second place in the Writers of the Future 20 Contest and debuted in August of 2005. Brad works as a software security consultant and lives in Racine, Wisconsin, with his wife, daughter, and two cats. He enjoys cooking spicy dishes, playing tennis, and hiding out on the weekends with his family. His Web site can be found at www.quillings.com.

  Donald J. Bingle is a top-ranked (but now retired) RPG gamer, an avid writer, and a reluctant attorney. His published game materials include adventures and source materials for Dungeons & Dragons, Paranoia, Chill, and Timemaster. His novels include Forced Conversion, a near future science-fiction tale, and Greensword, a darkly comedic eco-thriller. He has had stories in a variety of themed anthologies, including All Hell Breaking Loose, Renaissance Faire, Time Twisters, Slipstreams,

  Transformer’s Legends, Historical Hauntings, Civil War Fantastic, Sol’s Children, Furry Fantastic, Fantasy Gone Wrong, Players of Gilean, Carnival, The Search for Magic, If I Were an Evil Overlord, Pandora’s Closet, and Front Lines. You can contact him and/or find out about his latest projects at www.orphyte.com/donaldjbingle.

  Brenda Cooper has published fiction in Nature, Analog, Oceans of the Mind, Strange Horizons, in the anthologies Sun in Glory; Maiden, Matron, Crone; Time After Time; and more. Brenda’s collaborative fiction with Larry Niven has appeared in Analog and Asimov’s . She and Larry have a collaborative novel, Building Harlequin’s Moon, available now in book-stores. Her solo novel, The Silver Ship and the Sea, come out in March 2007. Brenda lives in Bellevue, Washington, with her partner Toni, Toni’s daughter Katie, a border collie, and a golden retriever. By day, she is the city of Kirkland’s CIO, and at night and in early morning hours, she’s a futurist and writer. See www.brenda-cooper.com for more information.

  Russell Davis has written numerous short stories and novels in a variety of genres under several different names. Some of his most recent work can be seen in Slipstreams; Maiden
, Matron, Crone, and Under Cover of Darkness. He lives in Nevada, where he writes, rides horses, and spends time with his family.

  Alan Dean Foster’s writing career began when August Derleth bought a long Lovecraftian letter of his in 1968 and much to Foster’s surprise, published it as a short story in Derleth’s biannual magazine The Arkham Collector. His first attempt at a novel, The Tar-Aiym Krang, was bought by Betty Ballantine and published by Ballantine Books in 1972. Since then,

  Foster’s short fiction has appeared in all the major SF magazines as well as in original anthologies and several “Best of the Year” compendiums. Six collections of his short form work have also been published. His work to date includes excursions into hard science-fiction, fantasy, horror, detective, western, historical, and contemporary fiction. His work has appeared and won awards throughout the world. His novel Cyber Way won the Southwest Book Award for Fiction in 1990, the first work of science fiction ever to do so.

  Paul Genesse told his mother he was going to be a writer when he was four years old, and has been creating fantasy stories ever since. He is a registered nurse on a cardiac unit in Salt Lake City, Utah, where he works the night shift keeping the forces of darkness away from his patients. Paul lives with his incredibly supportive wife Tammy and their collection of frogs. He hopes to turn Almost Brothers into a full-length novel, but his current project is Medusa’s Daughter, a fantasy set in ancient Greece. He encourages you to contact him online at www.paulgenesse.com.

  Over the past twenty years, Nina Kiriki Hoffman has sold novels, juvenile and media tie-in books, short story collections, and more than two hundred short stories. Her works have been finalists for the Nebula, World Fantasy, Mythopoeic, Sturgeon, and Endeavour awards. Her first novel, The Thread That Binds the Bones, won a Stoker Award.