Memory b-10

by Lois McMaster Bujold

  Right, right! Miles howled inwardly, with a small mental reservation for that one capsule removed five years back. That was going to complicate things, but perhaps the laboratory records would help, once retrieved.

  "You mean," moaned Weddell, "I racked my brains for a week reassembling that damned crap, and a whole undamaged sample was sitting downstairs all that time?"

  "Yep." Miles grinned. "I hope you like irony."

  "Not at this hour of the morning."

  The forensics man looked up and reported, "The lock has never been forced."

  "All right," Miles said. "The box goes to Forensics for a full examination. Ivan, I want you to go with it. Don't let those weasels up there sneak it out of your sight. Weddell, you take one of those samples for a molecular analysis—I want you to confirm itis the same crap you flushed out of Illyan's chip, and I want to know anything else you can figure out about it. It and you don't leave the building—you can have the same lab in the clinic again, and any supplies you care to requisition, but no one—no one—but you is to touch the sample. You report to no one but me. The last two units go back into the new box on the shelf, locked under my Auditor's seal. I trust it will stay there this time." Though I'm beginning to think it would be safer in my pocket.

  Haroche, the rat, had gone home to sleep last night after the systems team was assigned, an hour after midnight. While waiting for his return, Miles took a break for breakfast in the ImpSec HQ cafeteria. This was a mistake, he realized, catching himself dozing off into his coffee mug. He dared not stop. Somehow, getting started again was a lot harder than it used to be.

  He was yawning in Haroche's outer office when the ImpSec chief entered, also yawning. Haroche blearily swallowed his yawn, and motioned Miles to follow into his inner sanctum. Miles pulled up a chair and sat as Haroche settled behind his desk. "So, Lord Vorkosigan. Any progress?"

  "Oh, yes." Rapidly, Miles brought Haroche up to speed on the events of the last hours. Haroche, hunching forward on the edge of his station chair, wasn't yawning by the time he finished.

  "Damn," Haroche breathed, leaning back again. "Damn. There goes the last hope of this being anything other than an inside job."

  "I'm afraid so."

  "So now we have another list. How many men could have known the samples were down there?"

  "Five years' worth of Evidence Rooms inventory teams, for starters," Miles said.

  "The men who captured and delivered it," Haroche added.

  "And anyone working here at the time who might have been close friends with the men who captured and delivered it." Miles began to tick off the count on his hands. He wondered if he was going to have enough fingers. "It was filed under the seal of the Komarran Affairs chief who preceded Allegre. Allegre himself was still working on Komarr itself at that time, as the local section head. I checked. Also . . . any Komarrans in those revolutionary groups who escaped capture at the time, or who were imprisoned and have been recently released. People they might have talked to in prison . . . That list had better be checked too, I suppose, though, as you say . . . the comconsole tampering compels me to believe it's an inside job too."

  Haroche made a note. "Right. Not a short list yet, I'm afraid, by any means."

  "No. Though it's a lot shorter than the three planets full of people we started with." Miles hesitated, then added reluctantly, "I don't know if my brother Lord Mark—my clone, that is—knew about this stuff or not. It will be necessary to check, I suppose."

  Haroche's gaze rose to meet Miles's, his expression arrested. "Do you suppose—"

  "Not physically possible," Miles asserted. "Mark has spent the last six months on Beta Colony. Been to school every day since the term began." I hope. "His whereabouts are eminently provable."

  "Hm." Haroche reluctantly subsided.

  "Do you remember anything about that period?"

  "I was still assistant Domestic Affairs section-chief. It was just before my last promotion. I remember the flurry of activity over Komarrans in Vorbarr Sultana. The case that had riveted Domestic's attention right about then had to do with an antigovernment group in Vorsmythe's District suspected of trying to import proscribed weapons."

  "Ah. Well, I hope your data boys can help triangulate this," Miles went on. "Whoever did this must have had recent access to ImpSec's internal systems, plus a lot of wit and nerve. The short list is going to consist of the men who are on both lists."

  "Why are you assuming it's only one man?" asked Haroche.

  "Oh." Miles deflated. "Right. Thank you." Haroche, Miles reminded himself, was not without experience in this sort of thing.

  "Not that I wouldn't prefer it that way," admitted Haroche. "I'd much rather find myself dealing with one than a conspiracy."

  "Mm. But one man or a group, the motivation is growing . . . complex. Why me? Why was I picked to be the goat? Is there some special hatred at the bottom of this, or was it chance—was I simply the only ImpSec officer to be cashiered in the right time-window?"

  "If I may presume to advise you, my lord, motivations are a slippery thing in this sort of business. Too wispily cerebral. I always got further faster following the facts. You can spin theories about motivation later, over your victory beer. When you know who, you'll know why. I admit, that's a philosophical preference."

  When I know why, I'll know who. "It's true, there may be nothing personal in it. As soon as the crime was discovered . . . to be a crime, the, the … I can't call him a killer, I suppose. . . ."

  Haroche half-smiled, not happily. "We're short a body, for one thing."

  Illyan, for all his new vagueness, was hardly a zombie. But Miles remembered that hoarse distraught voice, begging him earnestly for a clean death. . . . "The assassin," he went on, "was absolutely required to supply a goat to take the heat off himself. Because this is not a case that can ever be closed except by being solved. No 'Hold pending further data' till it's dusty and forgotten this time. He had to know ImpSec would never rest."

  "You're damned right," Haroche growled.

  "That crap downstairs was carefully arranged to be found, because it was inevitable. Once the hunt was up, too many records existed in too many places for it to just be made to disappear. All I've done …" Miles's voice slowed, "was alter the timetable."

  "Three days." Haroche smiled crookedly. "You went through all of ImpSec in just three days."

  "Not all of ImpSec, just the headquarters building. And it was more like four days. Still . . . somebody must be squirming. I hope. If they meant to hook ex-Lieutenant Vorkosigan, and instead got Lord Auditor Vorkosigan … it must have felt like putting in your line for a trout, and pulling up a shark. I may have arrived just in time downstairs after all. Given the several more weeks of lead time he was expecting, our assassin might well have thought to yank his plant in the evidence room and try something else. God, I'd love to know."

  Who hates me, and works here? Could Lieutenant Vorberg have found out who Admiral Naismith really was . . . ? Vorberg couldn't possibly be so twisted as to destroy Illyan just to destroy Miles, could he? Surely I was a secondary target. He had to be a secondary target. The alternative was too horrible to think about.

  "Nonetheless, you've made extraordinary progress, Lord Vorkosigan," said Haroche. "I've cracked cases which started with far less data than what you've uncovered. It's good, solid work."

  Miles tried not to be too pleased with Haroche's measured praise, though he felt his face warm anyway. Haroche was such a contained man, his brief words were clearly the meaningful sort men might strive to win. Surely it was not disloyal to Illyan to hope his successor might yet grow to fill his place, not the same, but as well.

  "It's a shame," Haroche sighed, "that so many men in ImpSec HQ are fast-penta-proofed."

  "It's much too early to think of starting to pull out people's fingernails," said Miles, nibbling on one of his own. "Tempting as it is. I suppose . . . that we now wait on the reports from your systems analysis team. I suppose . . ."—a
nother yawn cracked his face—"that I might as well go home and get some sleep while I wait. Call me the minute they have anything to report, please."

  "Yes, my Lord Auditor."

  "Oh, hell, will you just call me Miles? Everyone else does. This Lord Auditor stuff is only fun for the first twenty minutes, after that it's just work." Not quite true, but …

  Haroche gave him wave that nearly qualified as an analysts salute, as he departed.

  Martin returned Miles to the front door of Vorkosigan House in the midmorning. Seductive visions of his soft bed filled his head. Dutifully, he went first to find his lady mother and say good-morning, or good-night.

  Two or three retainers' conflicting directions eventually brought him to one of the downstairs sitting rooms on the east side, filled with unusually pleasant morning light for this chill early winter. The Countess was sipping coffee and leafing through an old leather-bound tome Miles thought he recognized from Lady Vorpatril's Imperial wedding history assignment, the one that he had ducked. Better her than me.

  "Hello, love," she answered his greetings. She indulged herself by planting a maternal kiss upon his forehead; he stole a gulp of her coffee. "You were out late. Any progress on your case?"

  "I think so. The first crack, anyway." Miles decided not to disturb her morning by explaining that the first crack consisted of discovering himself being framed for the crime.

  "Ah. I wasn't sure if the abstracted look was that, or lack of sleep."

  "Both. I'm on my way to bed, but I want to talk to Illyan first. Is he up yet, do you know?"

  "I think so. Pym just took him up his breakfast."

  "Breakfast in bed halfway to noon. What a life."

  "I think he's earned it, don't you?"

  "The hard way." He sucked up some more of her coffee, and rose to go upstairs.

  "Oh. Knock, first," she advised him as he passed the doorway.

  "Why?"

  "He's having breakfast with Alys."

  That explained the book; Lady Alys had delivered it. He wondered what piece of Vorish history she was making poor Illyan read.

  As advised, he knocked politely on the door of the second-floor guest suite. No response: he knocked again. Pym had not lingered to serve the breakfast, it appeared, because instead of the retainer opening it, Illyan's voice finally floated through the wood: "Who is it?"

  "Miles. I have to talk to you."

  "Just a minute."

  The minute became two or three or four, as he leaned against the door frame and scuffed his boot on the patterned carpet. He knocked again. "C'mon, Simon, let me in."

  "Don't be so impatient, Miles," his aunt's voice admonished him firmly. "It's a bit rude."

  He closed his teeth on a snappish reply, and scuffed the carpet some more, and fingered his Auditors chain, and while he was about it unfastened the high collar of his brown-and-silver tunic. Some shuffling and clinking noises came from within, and a low laugh. At long last, Lady Alys's light step approached the door; a click, as she unlocked it, and it swung aside.

  "Good morning, Aunt Alys," he said dryly.

  "Good morning, Miles," she responded, much more cheerfully than he'd been expecting. She waved him inside to the sitting room. The cluttered breakfast tray was jammed onto the little table in the bay window overlooking the back garden. Only crumbs left, alas. Lady Alys was dressed oddly formally for this hour of the day, Miles thought, in a gown more suitable for dinner than breakfast, and was apparently experimenting with her hairstyle; it was loose, brushed in burnished black and silver waves down her back.

  Illyan appeared from the direction of the bathroom, shrugging on a tunic over his shirt and trousers, and still wearing bedroom slippers. "Good morning, Miles," he echoed Lady Alys, right down to the repellent morning-person chirp in his voice. His smile faded as he took in Miles s rumpled up-all-night look. His tone flattened. "What's happening?"

  "I found some very interesting things at ImpSec HQ last night."

  "Progress?"

  "Two steps forward, three sideways. Um . . ." He frowned at his aunt, wondering how to throw her out politely. She failed to take a hint, instead seating herself on the little sofa beside the table and attending to him with sharpened interest. Illyan sat beside her. Miles decided cravenly to let Illyan do the dirty work. "This is all highly classified, or it's going to be."

  He waited a beat, while they both looked at him. "Do you really think it's appropriate for Lady Alys's ears?" he added.

  Bad choice of phrasing; Illyan merely replied, "Certainly. Out with it, Miles, don't keep us in suspense."

  Well, if Illyan thought it was all right . . . Miles took a breath, and began a fast-forward description of his last day-cycle's investigation at ImpSec. Neither of his listeners interrupted him, though Lady Alys muttered, "Good for Ivan," when he got to the description of finding their prize needle in the haystack of Weapons Room IV.

  Illyan's cheerful air had vanished altogether; he sat tensely. Lady Alys watched his profile in concern, and took his hand; he squeezed hers in turn.

  "What I need to know," Miles finished, "is if you remember anything, anything at all, about the time that sample was brought in, during the thwarting of that last Komarran fling."

  Illyan rubbed his forehead. "It's . . . pretty blank. I remember Ser Galen's plot, of course, and that initial horrific fuss over discovering the existence of Lord Mark. The Countess was very upset, in her most Betan style. Drove your father to distraction. I remember your report from Earth. A masterpiece of its literary genre. That Sector Four adventure where you smashed both your arms was . . . right after that, right?"

  "Yes. But surely someone must have reported on the prokaryote to you. I can see why you might not have risked inspecting it in person."

  "I'm sure someone did." Illyan's right hand released Lady Alys's, and clenched into a fist. "They doubtless gave me all the details. And I doubtless put them where I always put the details. But there's nothing left now."

  Lady Alys frowned irritatedly at Miles, as if it were somehow all his fault.

  "Who ought to have given you that report?" Miles pushed on.

  "General Diamant, I suppose. Komarran Affairs chief before Allegre, you remember him? Died just two years after he retired, the poor sod. Miles, I really can't . . . I would surely have been reminded before this, if it were in here!" He clutched his head in frustration. Lady Alys recaptured his hand, and stroked it soothingly.

  "Does your friend Captain Galeni have any ideas?" Illyan went on more calmly. "He might have some inside track. It was his fathers plot, after all."

  Miles smiled unhappily.

  Illyan's eyes narrowed. "You know he's going to turn up on your short list, as soon as it's generated."

  "Yes."

  "Did you tell Haroche?"

  "No."

  "Why not?"

  "It would have been redundant. Duv will be checked along with everyone else. And . . . I've done him enough bad turns lately."

  "Aren't you . . . prejudging your data—my Lord Auditor?"

  "Yow know Galeni."

  "Not so well as you do."

  "Just so. I'm not judging data at all, here. I'm judging the man's character. Motivations, if you like."

  "Hm," said Illyan. "Just watch your own motivations there, old son."

  "Yes, yes, I know. I not only have to be impartial, I have to appear so. You taught me that one," he added rather nastily. "In a way I'm not likely to forget."

  "I did? When?"

  "Never mind." He pressed the bridge of his nose. He was not only exhausted, he was getting a fatigue headache. It was time to quit for the night, or he'd be unable to function properly on the next round.

  "All right," he sighed. "Last thing. Do you remember, at any time in the last four months, anyone ever giving you a small brown capsule to swallow?"

  "No."

  "There's two missing. He might have taken one himself at the same time, right along with you." Whoever he was.


  "No." Illyan sounded more certain than usual. "I haven't taken any medication in the past thirty years except what my personal physician gives me with his own hands."

  Miles recalled Haroche's more-than-one-man theory. "It might even have been your own physician. It's the small brown capsule I'm trying to track."

  Illyan shook his head.

  Miles levered himself up, and made polite farewells, and staggered off to bed.

  He woke in the mid-afternoon, and spent a futile half-hour trying to return to sleep, while his mind worried his new problems. He gave up, rose, and checked in with Haroche by comconsole; the systems analysis team had not yet offered their report. A call to Weddell in the ImpSec clinic labs elicited mostly snarls at the interruption, but also a promise of more information soon. Soon, but not yet.

  His restless prowling around his room was interrupted in turn by a call from a very bleary Ivan, who reported the original biocontainer box had been duly examined and returned by Forensics, and could he for God's sakes give the damn thing to somebody else and go off-duty and go to bed now? Miles flinched guiltily, glad Ivan could not detect sleep on his breath over a comconsole, and ordered him to return the box to the guardianship of the Evidence Rooms, and take the rest of the day off.

  He was just stepping into the bath when his comconsole chimed again. This time it was Dr. Chenko, from the Imperial Military Hospital's veterans clinic.

  "Lord Vorkosigan." Chenko ducked his head in cheery greetings. "My apologies for taking so long. These micro-engineering challenges always prove a little more complex in the execution than the planning. But we've worked up a device small enough to insert under your skull to, we hope safely, trigger your seizures, and we're finally ready to test it on you. If it works properly, we can go ahead with the final calibrations and schedule surgery to install it."