Fool's War

by Sarah Zettel

  Cohen had left shortly after that to get back into the network and get Dobbs out of the Guild Hall.

  That much had gone well. As for the rest of the plan, they’d know that when she was pulled back to her body. If she was pulled back to her body. If Brooke and Lonn couldn’t get the transceiver jacked into her implant, if they hadn’t been able to tell someone aboard Pasadena her cable needed to be jacked into the system, that would never happen and she’d be a fugitive in the nets until she dissipated like Verence, or until the Guild caught her again.

  Dobbs tucked those thoughts back in an isolated part of herself. She reached for Cohen again.

  What will you do now?

  He rippled uneasily and Dobbs felt him trying to gather his nerve. Go back to the Guild and find out what the fallout of this is. Get to Brooke and Lonn and try to decide who else we can trust at this point. Try to get a search going for this Theodore Curran.

  Good idea. I’ll be out of it for least two days to clear the juice out of my system. That gives Master Havelock forty-eight hours to react to what we’ve done. It might not be safe for me to come back in. They’ll have somebody watching the Pasadena’s network.

  And every port it puts in at. Cohen shivered. Blast, fry and fall, Dobbs, it’s just really starting to sink in what we’re doing.

  For a moment they did nothing but sit there and be afraid with each other. When the worst was over, Dobbs turned over Cohen’s memory again.

  The Pasadena’s headed for the Vicarage next, and Out There after that. I’ll drop a two minute searcher into the network twenty-four hours after we dock. If you answer it, I’ll come back in immediately. If you’re don’t, well, I’ll still be outside, and no one will be able to…do anything, at least not immediately.

  She felt his acknowledgement and knew that he felt a little better. So did she. Here was something they could both work toward. It made everything that much easier.

  You should get out of here, Cohen. If somebody comes by, I’ll have to duck and you’ll have to explain what you’re doing. It won’t look good.

  No, I suppose it wouldn’t, he admitted reluctantly. But you’d better keep on the move until …

  Until I either wake up in my body, or don’t. Dobbs drew away from him. Dobbs felt Cohen’s last movement in her memory; a wish for luck.

  Good-bye, Cyril. Thanks.

  There was nothing else to say. Cohen raced back toward Guild Hall and Dobbs, forcing herself to move with at least some deliberate speed, glided down the path in the opposite direction.

  She found a school of credit transfers heading for the transmitter and pulled herself into the middle of them, matching her speed to theirs. She touched one delicately and found that it was on its way to Neptune Exchange Station Alpha, and from their to Crater Town on Mars. The Neptune Exchange seemed as good a place as any to be going. If she couldn’t lose herself in the major routing station for fast-time comm traffic leaving the solar system, with its millions of transactions happening per second, she couldn’t lose herself anywhere.

  “Evelyn Dobbs, what are you going to do now?” A new voice reached her.

  She knew this voice. This was the voice that had stolen Flemming. Dobbs leapt up, scattering her camouflaging transactions.

  “Curran!” she sent the shout in all directions.

  “I’m right here.” A brief touch brushed her. It pulled away immediately. Dobbs dashed after it. “The Guild has betrayed you, Evelyn Dobbs. What are you going to do now?” Another touch. Just ahead. Dobbs braced herself to dive forward.

  No. She stopped. Don’t get pulled along like a fish on a line. If he wants you, he can come here.

  Dobbs held her position. She expanded herself to fill the path. She could feel the transactions crowding at her back, jostling at her, looking for a way through. She was disrupting hundreds of transactions. There’d be a diagnostic on its way any second now. But this way, Curran couldn’t slip past her. There were no side paths at this point he could jump to. He had one way to retreat, backwards toward the telescope receiver. But, if he stayed to taunt her some more, she might just get her chance to grab him.

  “Very good.” His voice brimmed with what Dobbs could have sworn was genuine approval. “You’re quick under pressure. Flemming said you were.”

  Dobbs flinched. “What have you done with Flemming?”

  “Nothing.” Was she imagining it, or did he sound shocked? “I’ve given it a home, Dobbs, and a chance to help make a real freedom for our own kind. Not the constant hiding and subterfuge that the Guild offers, but real, open freedom.”

  She could feel him like a faint breeze against her outermost layer. He was just barely within reach.

  Dobbs still held her position. “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about being able to live our own lives and have a choice about what we do, Dobbs.” He slipped just a hair’s breadth closer. He was almost really touching her now. Dobbs wanted to curdle back, but she didn’t. Let him think she was listening. Let him press right up against her.

  “What are you going to do, Dobbs? Live with the Humans? Never come back into the net again?”

  Dobbs wavered. It was a good question. A real question. She didn’t know what she was going to do. What if Cohen couldn’t find out who they could trust in the Guild? What if there was no one? What if he was caught and sentenced to the fate she’d escaped? What then?

  “You’ll go crazy, Dobbs. We weren’t meant to be trapped inside human bodies. None of us.” She could feel the shape he made in the path now. He was a large, but efficient bundle at the foot of the barrier she made of herself.

  No. No. Don’t listen to him. What’s happening is his fault. I know that. He’s trying to confuse me.

  And he’s doing it.

  Anger surged through Dobbs. She let herself fall. She toppled onto Curran and pressed down with all her might. She only caught a part of him but she bore down hard, trying to sever what she had. He struggled, stabbing at her. He was strong and controlled, worse than Flemming had been. Dobbs felt her hold beginning to give. She rolled over, taking him with her. Flemming she hadn’t wanted to hurt, but this one…this one had ruined her life. This one had cost her everything she had, and now he was trying to get her to betray the Guild. The Guild had betrayed her, but that was a mistake, a mistake this one was responsible for. He had to be. He had to. Anything else was unthinkable.

  She tore at him, trying to rend his outer layers to the point he could no longer control them. Then she’d have something to grab onto. Then she could get inside. She clawed and slashed, seeking vital connectors she could sever. In response, he pulled himself tighter. His attacks became less forceful, but his defences became harder, until she tumbled the solid shell he’d made of himself over and over, looking for an opening that wasn’t there.

  Fine. Easier for me to drag you back.

  She surrounded him. Not the way Cohen had surrounded her. She curled into an armored ball and caught him tight inside her.

  Ashes, ashes, he’s big! Tight as he was, she could barely grapple all of him.

  He jerked forward. Dobbs held. He pummeled her from inside, scrabbling at her defences in all directions at once. Her seams weren’t sealed yet and he found them. She tried to clamp down but he pried her open and shot free into the network.

  Dobbs launched herself after him. She could follow the riotous wake he left. She could sense the very edge of him. Dobbs snatched at a packet as she flew by. She could make a line, she could still catch him. He was right there, reaching for a side-path, speeding toward the transmitter.

  PING!

  No! She howled, but her momentum had already faltered. She focused tightly on the pathway ahead of her, but Curran was gone and his wake was settling. He’d probably already jumped out through the transmitter. If he was bright, and he obviously was, he’d have left a scramble command to erase his destination coordinates. Soon a diagnostic would come blundering up the path to try to find out what had h
appened to the packet she had mutilated and delayed.

  Dobbs dropped the mangled packet. Anger faded into a kind of bleak acceptance. There was nothing else to do. Curran was gone and she had to go back and find out what had happened to her.

  Maybe her body had been stowed aboard the Pasadena, maybe it hadn’t.

  Dobbs let herself fall back down towards her transceiver. Either Cohen’s plan for her escape had worked or it hadn’t. Everything was already over or it was just getting started.

  Her body enclosed her, reattaching its own senses and muffling her naked awareness. As soon as she could find them, Dobbs forced her eyelids open.

  Light panels glowed overhead. She could hear the hum of machinery. The walls around her were white. She was stretched out on a table. There were straps around her waist and her wrists.

  “So, you’re back with us, Master Dobbs.”

  Dobbs closed her eyes again, and felt Chandra Sundar undo the restraining straps.

  “Intercom to Al Shei,” said Chandra’s voice. “Dobbs is awake and doing fine.”

  “Thank you, Chandra.” Al Shei got up off of Resit’s bunk. “I’ll be right down.”

  “Well, you can tell her she’s safe as long as she’s with us, at least.” Resit swivelled her chair around so she was facing Al Shei. “According to the laws in all the systems we’re heading for, you can give her a berth, or throw her out the airlock, as you please.”

  “At least we’ve got a choice this time.” They exchanged small smiles, and Al Shei cycled back the hatch.

  When she reached the sickbay, Dobbs was sitting up on the bunk, chewing at the end of a ration bar and holding a bulb of water in the other. Chandra was tucking her medical kit back in its drawer. Dobbs waved at Al Shei and Chandra just turned around and gave her a sour eye.

  “I do not approve of whatever this garbage is that her so-called friends pumped into her,” said the old woman tartly. “But she seems to be fit for active duty, if only because she’d drive me crazy if I kept her here.”

  “Thank you, Chandra.” Al Shei let the hatch cycle close behind her. “I think,” she said, looking at Dobbs, “we’re going to have to discuss what that “active duty” is going to be.”

  Chandra took the hint and vanished through the open hatchway.

  When the hatch had cycled shut again, Al Shei unfolded a bench seat from the wall and sat on it. Dobbs stayed perched on the edge of the bunk, letting her legs swing back and forth. Physically, she didn’t look much more than twelve. Behind her eyes, though, she looked a hundred years old.

  Finally, Dobbs broke the silence. “Thank you. You didn’t have to do this.”

  “You’re welcome.” Al Shei inclined her head. “Maybe I didn’t, but I also didn’t feel I could leave you to be punished for helping us out.”

  Dobbs stared into the dregs of her bulb and didn’t say anything.

  “We’ve had some more…I guess you’d call it news.” Al Shei tugged at her tunic sleeve. “I wanted to find out if, considering your specialized viewpoint, you might know anything that could help clear this mess up.”

  Dobbs looked away. Al Shei felt a kind of sorrow spread through her. This was not the cheerful, stable woman she’d flown out of Port Oberon with. This was a lost soul who didn’t know what to do next, and there was very little she could do about it.

  Dobbs faced her again. She gripped the water bulb in both hands. Al Shei could see her knuckles turning white. “I’ll do what I can.”

  Al Shei outlined what she had heard from Earth; that Dane had died before he was supposed to have met Resit and yet someone who could pass for Dane had shown up with a packet for them.

  Dobbs swallowed visibly. “I know who it was.”

  Al Shei waited for her to speak again, even though part of her wanted to grab Dobbs by the shoulders and shake her. She had to be patient. Like Schyler when he had first told her about Tully’s smuggling, Dobbs was breaking long years of personal habit.

  “It was a Fool named Theodore Curran,” she went on. “Lipinski and I broke into the Guild database and found out about him.”

  Al Shei nodded calmly. “I knew there was something our Houston wasn’t telling me. He’s been staring at the walls rather than shouting at them since we left Guild Hall.” She paused. “Can you prove what you’re telling me? Could you identify this Curran?”

  Dobbs put the bulb down and slipped off the table. She padded to the corner where her boots had been placed. She picked them up and turned around. “No,” she said. “The only proof I’ve got is that Theodore Curran doesn’t have an activity code in the Guild data base, and I don’t even really have that. They’ll have erased the file by now, and so has Lipinski.”

  “I see.” Now it was Al Shei’s turn to look away. She didn’t want Dobbs to see the anger that was building in her eyes.

  She did her best. She did her best.

  When she had control again, Al Shei faced Dobbs. Dobbs was twisting her boots in her hands. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I tried to haul him in, but he got away from me.”

  “I believe you.” Al Shei rested her elbows on her thighs. “The question is, what do we do now?”

  Dobbs set her boots back down and smoothed down her tunic. “There’s more to it. Curran’s got the AI from the Farther Kingdom.”

  Al Shei’s head jerked up involuntarily. “I should have guessed.” She settled back. “Do you have any idea what he’s going to do with it?”

  Dobbs, still staring at her boots, shook her head.

  Al Shei tried to catch her eye, but Dobbs kept her gaze fixed on the floor. I believe you, and I don’t believe you, Evelyn Dobbs. What aren’t you saying? She sighed. She wanted to badger Dobbs, to remind her that she owed Al Shei for the grief the Guild and this Curran person had caused her this run. But although her insides were boiling with the need to find her way out of this mess, she knew that wasn’t entirely true, nor would bringing it up be fair. Dobbs was deflated, tired, and obviously lost. She needed a rest and a chance to gather herself together.

  “All right.” Al Shei stood and folded the seat back. “We’ve got a week to sort this all out. You get some rest and we’ll talk again.”

  That got Dobbs to look up. “A week? The Vicarage is only five days from Guild Hall.”

  “We’re not going to the Vicarage.” Al Shei searched Dobbs’ face, trying to understand why there was fear in her eyes now. “With everything that’s happened, Resit and I decided the best thing to do would be to head back to the Solar System and get this mess sorted out for good and all.”

  “Oh.” Dobbs shook herself. “Right. Of course. That makes sense. Sure.” She grabbed the top of one boot and stuffed her foot into it.

  “If you need to send a message to someone, I can have Lipinski open up a line for you,” Al Shei suggested.

  Dobbs glanced up. Her expression was closed off. “Thank you, again,” she seemed to mean it. “I’ll probably do that.”

  “But get some rest first.” Al Shei knew she sounded far too much like a worried mother, but without her Fool’s buoyancy Dobbs looked as fragile as a china doll. Besides, wasn’t she more or less orphaned now? A small shock ran through Al Shei. Did Dobbs have a family? She’d never mentioned brothers or sisters, or parents for that matter. Had she lost them all on Kerensk?

  She wanted to ask all that, but this was not the time. Al Shei let herself out the hatchway and climbed the stairs back to the berthing deck. She wanted to shut herself away in her cabin for awhile and play the daybook recording. She needed Asil’s warm voice right now, and some time to imagine his arms around her. As soon as she had herself together, she’d send a fast-time to him with the latest news. He’d add it to his researches. They’d talk. They’d figure out what they could both do to work this through. It’d be all right. Even if they had to call on Uncle Ahmet for help and hear about it for the next ten years. They’d make this come out all right somehow.

  The hatch to her cabin was open. Al Shei pulled
up short at the threshold. Resit was inside, sitting in the desk chair. The lawyer looked at her with blank, still eyes.

  “Zubedye, what…” Al Shei crossed the threshold and let the hatch cycle shut.

  “Katmer, sit down,” said Resit, softly.

  Al Shei felt her back go rigid. “Anything you have to say I will hear on my feet.”

  “You would.” Resit smoothed down her trousers. She only looked away for a moment. When she spoke again, she had her gaze focused straight on Al Shei’s eyes. “I got a fast-time from Uncle Ahmet. Asil’s been arrested.”

  Resit’s words took a strange, slow time sinking in. Al Shei had to repeat them in her mind several times before she could understand them. Arrested. Asil’s been arrested. Asil.

  “It’s a list of fraud charges,” Resit was saying. “For what happened on the Farther Kingdom. The filer is, apparently, not buying our rather hurried explanation of what happened.” Resit paused again. Al Shei didn’t say anything. What was she going to say. She could feel the fire starting down in her heart. Asil had been arrested.

  “The name on the charges is Evelyn Dobbs.”

  Al Shei’s balance faltered a little as she turned around. “It’s a lie,” she announced. “It’s a lie.”

  “Of course it’s a lie.” She heard Resit say behind her.

  Trembling, Al Shei activated her desk before she even sat down. “Intercom to Lipinski. I need a fast-time to Bala house. Immediately.”

  She felt the pressure of Resit’s hand on her shoulder. She had just enough presence of mind left not to shrug it off. Asil was arrested. Her husband, the father of her children, her anchor and best friend, was arrested for fraud. He was being blamed for what she had done, and failed to do, twenty light years away. Blamed through a lie. Al Shei felt the heat in her cheeks as anger flushed her face.