by T. M. Catron
I’ve made my choice.
Geneva isn’t too far away. They can pick you up there if you change your mind. Eventually, you’ll go back.
I’m never going back.
IV
Goa
29
Flight
“India?”
Toral nodded. “India. Believe it or not, Hiraani is there. And I trust her implicitly. Once I’m there, I can figure out what to do about the mole.”
“Why is she there?”
“You can’t ask me questions like that, Morse.”
We sat in a small hotel room, planning our next move. Outside the windows, Geneva was calling to be explored. But sight-seeing wasn’t an option—it never had been for me. I was surprised I was thinking about it now.
“What about weapons?” I unsheathed my knife from my calf and held it up.
“What kind of metal is that? It’s darker than steel.”
“Titanium,” I lied. It was a knife made of a Condarri metal not found on Earth.
“We’ll have to find weapons once we get there, but you can’t take that on a plane unless you check it.”
I was unwilling to leave it. My knife was practically a part of my arm. My only tie to Condar, the other hybrids. My past, now.
I should get rid of it.
But I wouldn’t.
We agreed on Goa, where Hiraani could pick us up. Toral would contact her when we arrived. I called and booked us a flight under yet another pseudo.
“That’s not going to work,” she whispered. “I don’t have another passport with me—at least not one that won’t be known by my agency.”
I dug into my coat pocket and pulled out three fake passports. I tossed them to her.
She opened one—mine. “Richard Smith. Pretty unimaginative. I liked Stallings better.” She opened the next and shot me a look. “You already have one with my picture on it? Victoria Smith? Are we supposed to be married?”
“Is that so hard to believe?” I winked at her and eased back painfully against the headboard.
“When did you do this?”
“I know a guy in Paris. When you moved into the apartment, I had one made for you and Charan.”
“Charan was the third reservation, then?”
“Yes.”
But you killed him, Morse. And you didn’t have to because you turned traitor anyway.
I ignored a new wave of regret and nausea that hit me. I didn’t understand them. I’d killed before. This was different, though.
“Why did you make our passports?” Toral asked.
“I couldn’t have something happen to you two—you were my ticket out.”
“And now you’re my ticket out.” She walked over to me and put a hand on my face—the one place on my body that wasn’t in pain.
“Remember when I asked for a favor?” I said.
“Yes.”
“I’m going to call it in now.”
She suddenly looked leery of me. “And what is it?”
“If for any reason, I say I have to leave, or that you need to hide or get away from me, I need you to do it. No questions, no hesitation. I don’t care what danger you think I might be in, or if you don’t perceive any danger. I need you to honor my wish.”
“Expecting something? Who else would be chasing you other than EW? He’s after both of us.”
“It’s not Emerson-Wright.”
“Part of your secret?”
“Yes.” I took Toral’s hand. “Promise me.”
She squeezed my hand and sat beside me on the bed. “What’s the code word?”
“Marseille.”
“Okay.”
She leaned over and kissed me, her hand going to my leg. I returned the kiss, wishing rather than hoping for more. Even though my entire body was bruised and suffering.
If she finds out what you are, she’ll run. And if you let this go farther, she’ll find out.
The thought hit me so forcefully that I pulled back, wincing.
“Okay?” she asked. “Did I hurt you?”
“I’m okay.” I slid off the bed and went to sit in the chair. “Get some sleep. I won’t be able to.”
The next day, we boarded a plane for Mumbai. Toral slept next to me on the flight, her head resting on a tiny pillow. Her head drooped and fell off the pillow, and she jerked awake. She blinked at me, smiled, and readjusted it.
I stretched and checked my watch. Two hours into a nine-hour-forty-minute flight. If only I had the Nomad, we would have landed in Mumbai in seconds.
The Nomad had been a pet project of mine, a spacecraft created from a blend of Condarri and human technologies. Before I’d been sent to Earth, I worked on it for two years, fine-tuning the small craft. Its stone hull matched the Condarri ships I had always known, jagged and slate-like. Its engines could propel the ship across the galaxy. But it was smaller than Condarri ships, no bigger than a house. The inside, with its bunks and bathrooms and seats, was built to accommodate human-sized hybrids, not the giants of Condar.
I laid my head back and closed my eyes. The ship wasn’t mine even though I had designed and built it almost entirely on my own. By now, Condar had assigned others to use it. I didn’t know who. I wondered what Toral would think if she knew about it.
The minutes ticked by. Toral woke. I leaned over to her. “Feel like talking?”
She nodded and sat up, rubbing her hands over her eyes.
“Ever been to India?” I asked.
“No, you?”
“No.”
30
Hide
A landing in the dead of night. Another flight to Goa. Once again, I’d been without sleep for four days. That, in addition to my injuries, was making me surly.
At the airport, I rented a Jeep and drove us through the narrow streets to the beach, dodging other cars and bicycles. India smelled differently from Europe—heat and sweat and dirt and spices. Toral sat in the passenger seat dozing, unaffected by the new smells. Maybe only a hybrid could sense the differences.
The sun was setting over the water when we arrived. The small hotel was built in Western style with private balconies opening out onto a stretch of beach.
“Stay in the car while I check it out,” I said.
“Why should you go by yourself?” asked Toral.
“Because I’m better at this than you. Stay in the car, please?”
“Alright, but it’d be a shame for us to come all this way and you get killed.”
I listened a moment, taking in the scene around me. The hotel lobby was quiet. I walked up to the automatic doors and entered. I’d already made a reservation.
From there, I went up to our room. The knife was again strapped to my calf. It was the only weapon I had now, so I drew it as soon as I entered. Pleasant, modern furnishings greeted me. One look told me everything was okay.
The room was small but comfortably furnished in dark-stained wood. Bamboo floor, not carpet, covered the room. It was a ground level room, so I walked out the back onto the beach, then around the side of the hotel. When I had come full circle, I walked back through the hotel to get Toral.
“Anything?” I asked her.
“No. All quiet.”
“Don’t tell me you’re going to sleep in the chair,” she said when she saw the small room.
“Would you rather I slept on the beach?” I never exactly knew how to take Toral. Even after some close moments and near misses, I couldn’t tell if she was flirting to keep me happy or if she was genuinely interested.
“You need to rest. Relax.”
I laughed, harder than I meant to. It hurt my ribs. I had just abandoned my alien masters who would surely hunt me down and kill me, and Toral wanted me to relax. My only consolation was that I had a head start.
I’d decided I had three weeks before they started looking for me in earnest. When I didn’t respond, they’d send a hybrid to Paris to investigate. Then the hunt would begin. But if I didn’t respond to their summons, I could keep
hiding.
“We’re safe here a while, you know,” she said, oblivious to my inner turmoil. "Thanks to your phony passports. And Hiraani can help us.”
“Maybe.” I chuckled. “Did you see the way the hotel clerk checked our passport names to make sure we were married? He tried to hide the fact that he was looking.”
Toral shrugged. “Different cultures, different customs. Even here in Goa, I guess the locals hold to their own traditions outside the Westernized sections.”
“When are you contacting Hiraani?”
“Tomorrow.”
“We need weapons.”
“And clothes. Mine need to be laundered.”
“I can help us with weapons.”
“You can? How?”
“I know a guy.”
“You always say that. Is this guy safe?”
“Not at all, but I can safely get us a stash of weapons, and he won’t even know who he’s dealing with.”
Toral looked skeptical. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“I thought you’d be happy.”
She pursed her lips.
“Look, I know a thing or two about being undercover. Let me handle this one, okay? Then you won’t put Hiraani in a bad situation, either.”
“You don’t want me to call her.”
“No, I don’t. I mean, as a last resort we could, but we’re better off if no one in your circle knows we’re here.”
“Don’t you think I know that? I can’t just disappear, Morse! I’m not like you! I have an obligation to make sure the agency knows about their leak.”
“And you’ll risk getting killed for your obligation?”
“If I have to. It’s what I do.”
I shook my head. “They’ll leave you high and dry.”
“No. We’ll get it to the proper people. You don’t understand.”
“I do understand, Toral. I understand that to run away feels like hiding. But if you stand your ground, you could be killed, or at the very least suffer extreme consequences. Don’t think for one moment that I don’t understand. Because I had to run too.”
Toral crossed her arms, her eyes narrowing. “Who are you?”
“Someone who isn’t ready to die! Or see you die.” I sat on the bed and ran my hand through my hair, then through my four-day-old beard. “We need to let all this calm down. Lull everybody into forgetting about us, or at least not be in the forefront of their minds. Then we can take further action.”
“You want to hide in this hotel room for months, griping at each other and using up all your money?”
I looked up at her, suddenly amused despite the seriousness of the situation. “Who says we have to gripe at each other? I don’t plan on being difficult. Do you?”
“No.”
“Okay then.”
After our conversation, I left the room to give her some privacy and to scout the area. Toral teased me again about my sense of modesty, but I didn’t want any kind of contact to spiral into something I couldn’t resist. I still didn’t know how to handle her finding out about my adarre… or who I was.
I returned to the hotel after she’d fallen asleep tucked under the covers. Despite her exhaustion, she was beautiful. I sat on the edge of the bed and wondered how I was going to make this work. I knew I was selfish for bringing her with me. Knew I never should have brought her into my apartment in Paris. Charan too. They would both be better off now if I had just steered them in a false direction.
With a start of surprise, I identified what I was feeling—guilt. It was new to me, and so I hadn’t recognized it at first. That explained the nausea, then, when I thought about Charan.
To counter it, I resolved that nothing would happen to Toral. I would defend her with my dying breath. It might come to that, I thought. My paranoia was eating away at whatever sanity I had left. I didn’t sleep all night, instead opting to sit in the chair and keep a lookout.
When Toral and I climbed into the Jeep the next morning, the sun was turning the sky a rosy pink. Even if we were lying low, we needed clothes and weapons. I was in charge of guns. Toral was in charge of clothing.
“So, if you’ve never been to India,” she said, “how do you happen to know a guy who happens to live in Goa and happens to be able to provide us with weapons?”
“Just a minute.” I jumped out of the Jeep and walked around it looking for bugs or tracking devices. Listening. If I tuned everything else out, I would be able to hear the hum from an open frequency. I heard nothing, so I felt around under the wheel wells to make it look convincing, then got back in the vehicle. Toral was feeling around under the dash. She nodded, and I put the Jeep in gear.
“Do you know where we’re going?”
“I glanced at a map last night down in the lobby.”
“You didn’t answer my question,” Toral said.
“I may have been to India.” Really, I hadn’t. I’d told her the truth the first time.
“And what else have you maybe done?”
“Are you asking personally or professionally?”
“There doesn’t seem to be a difference with you.”
I laughed. “You’re right about that.”
I turned onto a busy thoroughfare, toward a shopping district. The street was already crammed with vehicles of all sorts—two wheels, three wheels, four. An elephant.
“It’s one hundred degrees already, and you’re still wearing two shirts.”
I was wearing a cotton button-down and undershirt. “So?”
“You’re not even sweating.”
“Agent Patel, are you always like this?”
“Just commenting. Did I strike a nerve?”
“No, you just ask a lot of questions.”
“Occupational hazard.”
She was sharp. And she didn’t miss a thing. It’d have to be more like two hundred degrees for me to sweat. Hybrids were very convincing as humans, but we had a few differences that could be picked up on if anyone got too close.
We stopped for weapons first. I left her in the Jeep with the engine running and walked down a narrow side street. A cracked wooden door among the light stone. The concrete step was missing. I didn’t knock.
I’m here, I said silently.
Down the street, on the right, behind a chain link fence. Condarri marked. The voice echoed in my mind. I turned away from the door. The neighborhood grew seedier as I walked, with refuse and a strong smell of sewer warning strangers to stay away.
A two-and-a-half-meter high chain link fence—laced all the way with razor wire, no less—blocked off a small courtyard. The fence had been painted red, but most of it was peeling. No gate. I checked to make sure no one was looking and then took a step back. I flexed my muscles to make sure they were working well enough for what I was about to do. My shoulder was healing, but it still resisted any sudden movements.
I charged the fence and vaulted it, grabbing the wire on my way up. The barbs sliced open my hands, but I managed not to catch my clothing or hit my injured shoulder on it.
I landed lightly on the concrete below. Blood poured out of my fresh cuts. I held my hands away from my clothing, the pain registering at the back of my mind. The courtyard was littered with crates and metal boxes. None of them looked valuable. I searched until I found the right one. A solid metal trunk with a simple circle etched into it where there should have been a latch. It looked rusted, but that was just a bluff.
Open. I commanded. The circle split in two, and the lid cracked open. I lifted it and found a brown duffel bag bulging with my order. I checked it all before zipping it up and slinging it over my shoulder. Blood from my hands smeared the strap and zipper, but I couldn’t do anything about that. Toral was going to see the cuts anyway.
I closed the storage unit and repeated my acrobatics, up and over the fence. This time, I caught my leg on the wire. It tore through my jeans and sliced into my thigh. My hands received more abuse, cuts deepening as I hit the fence in the same places.
&nb
sp; When I landed, I paused to examine the damage. A red splotch soaked into my pant leg, but the wound was superficial. So much for not ruining my clothes.
When I reached the Jeep, Toral took one look at my pants and hands and got out of the car.
“Get back in, I’m alright.”
She walked around to the driver side and got in. I jumped in the back.
Toral drove us straight to a clothing shop, parking on the street right in front.
“Thought you’d never been to India.”
“I may have been here once,” she said. She turned to look at me. I was unzipping the bag once again, fishing for a handgun. I found a .44 Magnum Desert Eagle and proceeded to load its magazine.
“I want that one,” she said.
I stopped what I was doing, eyebrows raised. “Expecting trouble while you shop?”
“Can’t be too careful.”
I slid the magazine into the grip and holstered it. She took it, and it disappeared beneath her baggy shirt.
Now I knew I was in love.
Interesting. Was this what it felt like?
“You obviously need to stay here,” she said. “And stop bleeding all over everything.”
“Right.” I found a Glock 19 and loaded it. She stared at me, refusing to get out of the car. I sighed and removed my white overshirt. Toral gasped. I looked down to make sure she couldn’t see my adarre.
“Those bruises look terrible!” she said. “And what’s that scar on your left arm?”
My arm did look bad. The scarring was from the burn, now healed but hideously ugly. At least now I wouldn’t have to try to hide it from her. I tore two long strips from the back of my shirt, then used them to wrap my hands.
“Happy?” I asked.
She nodded and got out.
Her shopping took ten minutes. She returned with bags full of clothing.
“This should be enough to blend in for now,” she said, tossing the bags in the back seat.
“Didn’t have to knock off the store owner or anything, did you?”
“That reminds me. Is there a suppressor in that bag?”
