The Prodigal Sun
Page 21
“Because nothing has happened—yet. I—” He stopped. For a moment the only sound was that of the wind whipping across the skull of the hill. “I’ve been struck from the Commerce Artel,” he said at last, the words a long, slow exhalation of shame.
She gasped, despite herself.
“No, let me finish. It gets worse.” She waited, wondering how it could get worse. “Remember that offer we had from the Hutton-Luu System? The job we refused?”
“Well, the Axis felt otherwise.” She could sense the discomfort swell beneath his words. “They advised me to take it. What with this” —he waved vaguely at the now-invisible star—”they said I need to prove myself again; that I had to demonstrate to them that I still have what it takes.”
“But it didn’t,” he cut in. “It happened to me.” He paused before continuing, his breath catching in the sudden breeze. “Anyway, when I refused to comply to their ‘recommendation,’ they stripped me of my rank, ordered criminal proceedings to begin, and charged me with first- degree fraud.”
She shuddered at this: fraud was the most serious crime a delegate of the Commerce Artel could be accused of. In their books, not even murder rated above bad business.
“The COE transport arrives in a week.” He laughed his wheezing, exotic laugh while she struggled to take in what he was saying. “That’s right. I’m to be transported to the penal colony as a convict. A free ticket to exactly where they want me—and the only way I can escape is by doing what they want me to.” Although she couldn’t see it, she felt him shake his head. “I’ve been set up, Maii. And I didn’t even see it coming.”
She waited in silence as he breathed his bitterness into the wind. The plan he had devised was in his mind—only half finalized, but she could read it clearly. When she sensed that he was about to ask the question foremost on his mind, she preempted him easily:
She sensed the relief this aroused in him. “There are no guarantees—”
He squeezed her shoulder. “You know you don’t owe me anything, child,” he said. “But I’m glad you feel that way. The truth is, there’s no way I can make it through this without you.”
She reached out to take his hand.
He turned his eyes again heavenward. The star called Kabos had reappeared, although now it burned a deep, angry red. It brightened visibly as they watched, until it flared and became too bright to stare at directly.
“Come on,” he said, glancing down the hill. For the first time she noticed the trio of Olmahoi greyboots waiting for him at the hive’s massive entrance. “We need to get below ground. The shock wave won’t be far away.”
She nodded, allowing him to lead her down the hill, and...
* * *
Roche woke with a gasp.
Sitting upright on the narrow bunk, she put a hand to her forehead, trying to massage away the intrusive thoughts, to free herself of the last threads of the dream. Except it wasn’t a dream. She was sure of that. It was something else entirely, a memory that belonged to someone else...
A supernova in colonized space—a population huddling underground because a shield supplied by the Eckandar Trade Axis had failed—the Commerce Artel delegate responsible tried and found guilty of fraud—
It was all so familiar; something she had come across recently while on the Midnight. She was certain the IDnet news reports had mentioned it on a number of occasions: Ede System, one of the Olmahoi provinces near the Commonwealth of Empires border, had been an insignificant backwater until it became the victim of a stellar disturbance and was nearly destroyed by the failure of a planetary shield.
And the name of the Artel delegate responsible for the sale of that shield had been—Makil Veden.
How could she not have connected the name sooner?
Completely awake, she looked around. Struggling from the thin, dirty mattress, she saw Maii sitting cross-legged on the upper bunk, features completely still. Whether she was asleep or meditating, Roche couldn’t tell. Either way, she didn’t acknowledge Roche’s anger.
Roche was tempted to reach up and rouse the Surin but, sighing, decided against it. For the first time in what seemed like weeks, Roche felt alone—despite the young girl’s presence in the room—and she found herself welcoming the solitude.
The room was small and practical, containing only a narrow double bunk and primitive toilet facilities. Minutes after Sabra had brought her to it, Roche had fallen into a deep sleep, blaming fatigue for her sudden and overwhelming tiredness. Now she wasn’t so sure...
“You awake, Commander?”
The voice, from the door, broke the quiet Roche had been enjoying. She crossed the short distance to see who it was.
“Sorry to disturb you,” said Haid, his scarred, black face smiling at her. He was dressed in loose-fitting, black casuals that might once have been a shipsuit. “I was hoping to talk to you.”
Roche shrugged aside her irritation. “Likewise. But give me a moment.”
“Of course.” He averted his eyes while she dressed and changed the sling on her left arm. Maii didn’t move once, and Roche decided not to disturb her. If the girl really was asleep, then she obviously needed it. Accusations of mental tampering could wait until later—until she had decided which she was most angry about: the way the Surin’s memories had been thrust into her thoughts, or the abrupt way in which her own had been suppressed.
When she was ready, the rebel leader took her through a series of dimly lit tunnels and chambers. The subterranean headquarters was busier than she had assumed it would be—containing the homes of hundreds of people, as well as rudimentary markets, hospitals, industries, and entertainment facilities; as though a miniature city had grown around the rebel installation. In one large room they passed, at least fifty people had gathered to dine together; the smell of roasted meat caused Roche to hesitate at the entrance.
Haid took her arm to encourage her on. “We’ll eat soon,” he said, smiling. “I promise.”
“As long as it is soon,” she said. Haid led her down a flight of curving, narrow stairs. The deeper they went, the damper the walls became, as though they were approaching some sort of water table. Yet, when she stopped to test the moisture with a fingertip, she realized that the source of the water was industrial rather than natural. It had a bitter, pungent smell.
“There’s a leaky sewage outlet not far from here,” explained Haid. Roche grimaced and wiped the hand on her clothes.
“And you live down here?” It wasn’t disgust that stained her words, but rather amazement.
“I like to be near the others,” he said. “Helps remind me that I’m one of them.”
“More leaders should follow your example,” Roche commented, thinking of Proctor Klose and his private suite on the executive floor of the Midnight. As far as she was concerned, being in command meant more than simply giving orders. And it meant more than just wearing a fancy uniform and having access to luxuries, too. When it came down to it, that extra star on Klose’s uniform hadn’t helped him when his ship had exploded. Part of her couldn’t help wondering if the extra privilege may even have caused it, albeit indirectly. Had he been a better leader, more in tune with his crew and his ship, the Midnight might now be more than several thousand cubic kilometers of glowing, radioactive dust.
“This wa
y.” Haid took her arm and guided her to the next exit from the stairwell. On the other side was a floor much like the one they had left, although more extensively populated than the other.
They moved along the dank, slightly odorous passages for a while longer, until Haid arrived at a locked door. He keyed the lock by some unseen mechanism, and the panel slid aside. Entering first, he switched on lights and gestured at a chair.
Roche followed him cautiously, eyes scanning the room out of habit before actually stepping inside. It was furnished comfortably, but not ostentatiously so. One wall was dominated by an enormous desk, on which rested a complicated array of out-of-date computers. Two small, cushioned armchairs occupied the center of the room. A cloth hammock hung across one corner, near a narrow cupboard. Hanging from the wall opposite the desk was a multicolored mural. At least three meters wide and two high, it looked like a window to another world—and a familiar one at that.
Ignoring the chair, Roche approached the mural to take a better look. Grey sky rippled above a bleak and barren landscape, with jagged fingers of black rock clawing hopelessly for purchase on the clouds so far above. The scene was totally desolate, yet somehow managed to impart a sense of life—almost as though the rocks themselves were sentient.
“It’s Montaban, isn’t it?”
“That’s right.” Roche thought she detected admiration in the rebel leader’s voice. “You’ve been there?”
“Read about it.” COE Armada training covered several hundred of the more notable nearby worlds, including this one. “What made you paint it?”
“I was born there.”
Roche turned to face him. “Born there?”
“All the others—Emmerik, Sabra, Neva—they’re all natives of Sciacca, but not me.” He moved to the cupboard and opened it, unhampered by his single arm. “Drink?”
“Thanks.” She stepped over to the chair he had indicated and sat down. When he handed her a tall, thin glass filled with a clear liquid, she said: “So what’s your story, Haid?”
He smiled, his monocular sight gleaming in the faint light of the room, and raised his glass in a wordless toast, which Roche imitated. She took a mouthful of the liquid and was momentarily puzzled by the lack of taste. Then she realized: the glass contained nothing but water. A moment later, a second realization: a full glass of clean drinking water on Sciacca’s World would have been regarded as something of a treat to the rebels. Understanding this, Roche decided that sipping the drink would probably be the best means of acknowledging Haid’s generosity.
“I was a mercenary before coming here,” Haid began. “Tried and convicted after forty-seven successful juntas. Not that I’m boasting or anything. It’s just a fact, the way my life panned out.” He shrugged. “My parents were killed when I was fifteen, and they left me enough money to pay for anything I wanted. But theirs was a political killing, an underground thing, and I wasn’t safe. So I skipped town, bought myself as many implants as I could afford, and set out to find my own niche.
“My parents’ money,” he went on, “certainly made up for any lack of talent in those early years. If I found it hard to keep up, I just bought a new implant. Easy. I started off as a vigilante for hire until I got a taste for killing.”
Roche was somewhat surprised by the man’s frankness. He seemed completely at ease with his admissions, speaking with a total absence of guilt. It must have shown on her face, too, because he carried on with a few words of explanation.
“You must understand, Commander, that it paid extremely well. And you’d be amazed how easy it can become after the first couple of times.”
“How many?” said Roche. “How many people have you killed?”
“Hard to say.” He shook his head. “What with assassinations, fighting in the M’taio System’s Caste wars, the i-Hurn Uprising—hell, even with the implants I lost count.”
“So what happened?”
He sighed. “I had a rival, a young blood by the name of Decima Frey. She sold me to COE Enforcers in exchange for clemency when they caught her. I was hauled in and tried—so far gone, I didn’t really know what was going on. My implants were on a feedback kick, you see, with so many subroutines it was hard to tell where they stopped and I began.” He wiggled his fingers by his right ear. “Anyway, I was initially sentenced to be executed, but appealed and had it reduced to this.” He indicated his surroundings with a wave of his hand. “At a cost. I had to undergo rehabilitation first. And that didn’t seem such a big deal at the time—I mean, I figured rehab would be easy to fake and was confident I’d be able to escape soon enough. I was a killing machine, after all. No backwater penal colony was going to be able to hold me for very long.” The grin that touched his lips was wry and without humor. “At least that was what I thought, until I realized what the judge had meant by ‘rehabilitation.’“
Roche had learned about the process during her early years of training in Military College. “They stripped you of your implants,” she said.
The whirr of his monocle focusing upon her seemed loud in the sudden quiet.
“They dewired me from the inside out,” he said. “Everything went. There wasn’t a bone or a nerve untouched. My body weight must have dropped by about seventy-five percent. My neuronal mass went down by half. I tell you, I was jelly by the end of it—physically and mentally.”
“But how could they have taken care of you in that condition?” said Roche. “I mean, Sciacca’s World doesn’t have the facilities—”
Haid’s laugh startled her. “Take care of me?” He laughed again. “Boras—Delcasalle’s predecessor—she washed her hands of me very quickly. I was sent into the streets to fend for myself.” Light caught Haid’s monocle as he leaned forward. “And I was a cripple at that stage. It wasn’t until later that I salvaged this”—he tapped his arm on one leg—”and the eye from someone who was no longer... in need of it.”
Roche’s face creased in puzzlement. “You couldn’t have managed to do that by yourself, surely?”
“One of my old shipmates rescued me from the gutter. Got to me before the rats could finish the job the authorities had started.” He smiled self-deprecatingly. “I’m a far cry from the man I once was, but at least I’m alive, right?”
Roche nodded slowly. “For many here, that might not be something to be grateful for.”
“That’s why I’m with these people,” he said. “They’ve had it rough, but they’re not afraid to keep trying. They’re determined to get what they want in the end. The only thing they needed was a good leader—someone with experience at fighting in a modern way.” He tipped his head in an exaggerated manner. “And here I am. Gun for hire turned revolutionary.”
Roche smiled back. “And doing well, it would seem. This installation is well organized.”
“If a little underequipped and leaky at times. Yes. I try my best. It may be nothing compared to my old exploits, but it keeps me going. And I enjoy it, too. I guess having a personal stake in the outcome really makes the difference.” His glass eye winked at her. “Which brings us to you, Commander.” His expression became hard, grim. “You’re a serious threat to everything I’ve built—in more ways than one. So let’s hear your own story. Tell me about this mess you’ve brought to Sciacca.”
Roche put the drink on the floor by her chair and began to talk. Midway through Haid’s confession she’d realized that she had little to fear from the man, at least as far as secrecy was concerned. Her mission was of little relevance on the planet—except to her and the Dato Bloc—and any information she divulged would be unlikely to spread. Even in the improbable event that Haid decided to tell Warden Delcasalle, his word was sure to be doubted. Besides, she needed his help—there was no escaping this simple fact. And if the only way to gain that help was to tell the truth, then so be it.
He listened closely as she described how she had “collected” the Box from the AI factories on Trinity, and how she really had very little idea of either its potential or its purpos
e. He accepted her role as uninformed military courier as easily as she did: she wasn’t required to know; therefore she didn’t. When she described the ambush in the Soul and the means by which she and the others had slipped past the Dato ships and to the planet in the lander, he nodded appreciatively and commented that their tactics had been sound.
Cane’s unexplained appearance on the scene, however, bothered him.
“You say that Cane was instructed by someone to come to your room prior to the Midnight’s destruction. Presumably the same someone who let him out of his cell.” He frowned. “Any idea who that might have been?”
“No. The security records went up with the ship, and I’ve been too busy trying to stay alive since then to worry about anything else.”
“Understandable.” Haid sucked the tips of his plastic fingers. “Go on.”
There was little more to add: the crash of the lander; their rescue by Emmerik and the battle in Houghton’s Cross; their arrival in Port Parvati.
When she had finished, she refreshed her throat with a sip of water and leaned back into the chair. “What do you think?” she asked. “It’s not as good a story as yours—”
“Don’t be too quick to dismiss it,” Haid said, frowning.
“Do you think you can you trust me?”
“Perhaps,” he said. “Half of what you’ve told me doesn’t make sense, and what does bothers me.”
Now Roche frowned. “So you don’t believe me?”
He waved his hand dismissively. “That’s not what I’m saying at all. I do believe you—totally. But you’re not giving me the full picture, albeit unintentionally.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Well, take your mission for instance. Granted, the Midnight was a form of cover—but why here? If the Box is so important, for whatever reason, why send it to such a high-risk region when thousands of other routes were available? The Hutton-Luu System is so close to the Dato border that it’s almost begging to be annexed. All it would’ve taken was a small skirmish to put your mission in jeopardy. No. It doesn’t make sense at all.” Haid shook his head. “And then there’s Cane.”