Prisoner of Conscience

by Susan R. Matthews

  “The Domitt Prison’s assistant administrator, your Excellency. Merig Belan. Administrator Belan, his Excellency, Andrej Koscuisko.”

  On the one hand, technically speaking, the assistant administrator might rank equally with Koscuisko in the prison chain of command; or perhaps higher. On the other hand, Belan had asked to be presented, which clearly indicated his expectation of assuming the subordinate role.

  There was the fact of the Writ to consider. When his Excellency was not in the presence of his administrative superior, he was a functionally autonomous power in Port.

  “Administrator Belan. Are we to go to quarters, now?”

  Belan bowed. “The Administrator’s profound respects, your Excellency, and I’m to tell you that he’s indulged himself so far as to prepare a small reception in your honor on site. It’s not too long a drive, if your people would care to load?”

  Koscuisko was looking to Lieutenant Plugrath instead of responding directly; Plugrath answered in Koscuisko’s stead.

  “Administrator Belan, with your permission, I’ll see his Excellency to greet Administrator Geltoi personally. Because if I failed to escort the officer to the threshold of the Domitt Prison, Captain Vopalar would have some very unpleasant things to say to me about lack of respect and neglect of military courtesy.”

  Well, they’d be a little bit of a traveling-party, then. Because Belan had brought Security, and Plugrath had quite naturally had Security, even if Belan’s Security seemed a little on the ceremonial side of an officer’s escort and Plugrath’s Security looked a little to the assault-ready side of an honor-guard.

  For a moment Caleigh hesitated, looking down at the open roof of the touring car at the foot of the stairs; surely Koscuisko’s blond head would make too good a target against the dark plush fabric of the interior?

  It wasn’t for her to say.

  Nor was Rudistal a hostile Port. It was a Bench protectorate, and there hadn’t been any trouble at Rudistal, or Vopalar’s First Officer would have let her know. Surely.

  “Follow us, then, by all means.” Administrator Belan’s hearty agreement was a little forced, but not insincere. Caleigh decided it was just that Plugrath’s presence hadn’t been anticipated. “And now. Sir. The light will be going.”

  Was it her imagination, or did Lieutenant Plugrath frown as he caught sight of the touring car?

  The officer was beside her, at her elbow. “Miss Samons. We don’t want to keep these gentles from their third-meal.” He sounded a little amused about something; the careful dance taking place between Plugrath and Belan, perhaps. “A reception, perhaps there will be dancing girls. I beg your pardon, Miss Samons, that would be of limited interest to you, please excuse me.”

  If she was tense enough for the officer to feel a need to tease her in so formal a fashion — she was too tense by half; and for what?

  Caleigh Samons knew the answer to that one.

  “Life is full of surprises, your Excellency. Who knows. Maybe dancing boys provided specially for Chief Warrant Officers.”

  It was up to Plugrath and Belan to be tense just now. Especially Belan; it was his Port, after all. Oh, perhaps not his Port, but certainly his prison.

  Caleigh squelched her errant thoughts firmly into decent self-respecting silence, following Koscuisko down the stairs.

  ###

  The touring car that the Domitt Prison had sent for him had positions for three Security to stand on the running boards on each side, which meant that Chief Samons insisted on her place at the leftmost, rearmost post, and very tiresome of her, too. But there he was.

  There Miss Samons was, more to the point, with Code and Toska on his left, Kaydence and Joslire and Erish on his right, and no one for him to talk to except Lieutenant Plugrath and his assistant administrator, neither of whom were anything close to as stunningly seductive as Caleigh Samons even on a bad day.

  Perhaps it was just as well she was on the running boards behind him. Well out of arm’s reach. He was tired and he was very depressed, and in the mood he was in just at present he might very likely have suggested some activity to take his mind off his troubles that would be inappropriate. As well as just as likely to be politely rebuffed, which would only make his mood even more black and hopeless than it was already.

  “His Excellency had a good transit, one hopes?”

  Their cargo was loaded and the three-car convoy was under way, and Belan was trying to make conversation. Andrej had not had a good transit, unhappy about the souls entrusted to the Dramissoi Relocation Fleet and apprehensive about what awaited him at the Domitt Prison. But there was no sense in being gratuitously unpleasant to Administrator Belan even so.

  “Thank you, Administrator. Twenty-one, twenty-two days, almost restful, really. Rounds, of course.”

  The car traveled on through the dark streets, one long block of narrow buildings after another to either side and rather too close for Andrej’s comfort. A man could get claustrophobic in streets such as this, which was more than ridiculous on the face of it — that a man should have grown accustomed to live in Scylla’s narrow corridors and yet feel closed in upon and prisoned in the open air just because the warehouses in Port Rudistal had been built close and high. There had been an open area between Rudistal and the Domitt Prison, if Andrej remembered aright of what he’d seen from the launch-field. That would be a welcome break: but then they would be at the prison. That was not to be welcome.

  “Quarters are actually on site, then, Administrator?” He’d gathered as much, but he might as well have it confirmed, Andrej decided. That way he could get started on a truly world-class case of self-pity now, rather than wait a moment longer.

  Of course he had been preparing to immerse himself in self-pity ever since Captain Irshah Parmin had first told him that he was to be sent on this assignment. Still, truly professional results depended on thorough groundwork and advance preparation. There was no time like the present to finish off the foundations, and lay the first course of a monumental attitude problem.

  “There’s a penthouse suite prepared for his Excellency and his party,” the Administrator confirmed. “Every convenience. We hope you’ll be very comfortable, sir. And if there should be anything lacking you have only to let us know.”

  The car was slowing, but they were nowhere near the Domitt Prison; no, they were still deep within the cavernous bowels of the warehouse district, for all Andrej could tell. The car was slowing to avoid running into the car in front of it, the lead car with Belan’s Security from the Domitt Prison.

  Lieutenant Plugrath seemed to become a little agitated, all of a sudden.

  “Administrator, why are they slowing down, tell them to drive on. It’s not a good idea to idle in the streets with rank like this on board.”

  Behind him Andrej could hear the canopy rising to meet over his head and form a roof for the car. Who had decided to close the car he didn’t know. Maybe Chief Samons thought it would make the Bench Lieutenant feel better.

  “Of course, Lieutenant,” the Administrator agreed, his eagerness to please as evident as his confidence in the innocuous nature of the slowdown. “Bad in principle, though no cause for alarm, I assure you.”

  The car had almost stopped. Through the now-enclosed windows Andrej could see Plugrath’s Security detachment pass at the double, six men to the front car to see what the slowdown might be. His own Security would stay with him, naturally.

  The Administrator, frowning unhappily, keyed the car’s com-braid for transmit. “Sami, this is Belan. What seems to be — ”

  Then Andrej saw the car in front of them explode into a black fury of dust and scrap, with a huge furious roar that struck him like a blow and deafened him.

  An explosion, yes, he knew it had to have been an explosion, he knew what an explosion looked like, but still he only sat and stared without comprehension at the ruin of shards and fragments against the windows at the front of the car while the Administrator struggled frantically with the handle
of the car door. Trying to get out. Yes, that was right, they should get out of the car, a car stopped in the street was a sitting target, but who in the name of all Saints could they be shooting at?

  Lieutenant Plugrath was shouting something, but Andrej couldn’t hear a word, deafened by the blast. He’d better get out of the car before the Lieutenant was hit by accident. Not that he was interested in being shot at. He’d been shot at before; it had made him angry, the first time it had happened, it still made him angry. Were they shooting at him?

  Were they, indeed?

  Administrator Belan got the door open at last; the door was pulled open from outside, and frantic hands seized him on his way through the door to hurry him out. Security. Andrej started out of the car in turn, but they wouldn’t let him step foot to pavement.

  They grabbed him and threw him headlong to the street, and themselves down on top of him to half-drag his body bruisingly away from the car — toward the nearest wall, Andrej supposed, stupid with the shock of it. People were being shot at, Andrej could hear the impact of rounds against the pavement and the sharp report of Security’s weapons returning fire. Carbines. Mortars. Flame-throwers. Thorough of them, Andrej had to admit it.

  The ground lifted beneath him and struck him in the face with a bone-shattering blow that flattened his entire body and took his breath away.

  Shocked body and soul by the force of the blow, Andrej lay for long moments open-eyed, open-mouthed, before he could think to try and catch a breath.

  And then it hurt so much to breathe that he didn’t want to, and he stilled himself out of fear of the pain to come until his body made him gasp for air — which only hurt even worse.

  Years passed.

  Andrej fought for breath, and fought with the unwillingness of his own body to breathe, and tried not to notice the pain that came in to fill up the empty spaces as shock ebbed away and left him vulnerable.

  His heart began to beat again.

  He was lying on his belly on the pavement, the stink of rock-dust and overheated metal was in his nose, his cheek scraped raw against the rough pavement. There was something heavy and hot on top of him, covering him, pressing down on him — was he buried under an avalanche?

  Something told him no.

  Something told him he knew what had happened.

  If only he could put his finger on what that was —

  Then the weight shifted. Kaydence Psimas and Caleigh Samons alike rolled away from him carefully, and Andrej could turn over onto his back.

  “Excellency.” It was Toska, who should know better. “Excellency, are you all right, sir?”

  When it should be Kaydence and Chief Samons who should be asked, they had been more at risk than he had been. He had been protected by their bodies. If anybody was not all right, it would be them.

  The sudden shock of stunning pain ebbed rapidly, now. He was sore, yes, but not more than bruised from what little he could tell. He had to get up. He had people to see to. Kaydence, how was he? Toska? Chief Samons? The others?

  “Miss Samons,” Andrej croaked. His voice had got jarred loose in the explosion, as it seemed. He cleared his throat and tried again as Toska and Kaydence lifted him carefully to a seated position. Oh, holy Mother, he hurt. He was going to truly regret this, in the morning. “Miss Samons. Kaydence. Are you all right? What has happened? Where is everybody?”

  Now that he was sitting up, Andrej’s mind cleared moment by moment. He could see Kaydence, crouched down at his side. He could see Toska, whose face looked to be somewhat blackened with blown ash, but not burnt. Testing himself, arms and legs and knees and joints, Andrej took inventory, listening to Kaydence’s report.

  “No harm, your Excellency. Chief Samons and I had something to cushion the fall.” Andrej himself, that was to say, and if Andrej considered that his body was not near so pleasant a pillow as Chief Samons’ might be, the point remained that he was somewhat more yielding than the pavement to land upon. “Two explosions, your Excellency, probably mines. Buried in the street. Casualties mainly the prison Security in the lead car, and some of the Lieutenant’s people. Some shots fired, but none after the second explosion, and they seem to have run off the ambush pretty well.”

  “Where is Chief Samons? Toska, your face is dirty, have you been burned?” A man couldn’t help asking. A person got anxious.

  Toska pulled his white-square out of the front plaquet of his duty blouse and moistened a corner with his tongue before scrubbing at his cheek with experimental fervor. The white-square came away black; Toska’s skin was the color it was supposed to be, beneath — a little reddened from the chafing, but otherwise unburned. “Seems to be just soot, sir. Are you sure you want to stand up? Already?”

  Yes. He was sure. He knew he was alive; Kaydence and Toska appeared to be all right. Chief Samons had left his side as he’d sat up, and had not yet reappeared to make her report. There were Code and Erish and Joslire yet unaccounted for.

  Supported by Kaydence and Toska to either side, Andrej found his footing in the rubble and stood for a moment, grateful for the steadying hands of his Security. Looking around.

  To his right, the rearmost car, emptied now but apparently undamaged. That was the way they’d come, then.

  To his left, the wreck of the lead car, and the pavement torn up in chunks and heaps of rubble. Bodies, some half-buried in the debris, some apparently caught up in the twisted carcass of the lead car itself. Lieutenant Plugrath and the Administrator, talking to one of Plugrath’s people; hurrying over, once Plugrath noticed Andrej on his feet, making what haste they could over the chewed-up pavement.

  “Field-expedient ambush, sir, probably recognized the touring car on its way in. Two mines, apparently laid in maintenance traps beneath the pavement. Expected two cars, with the Administrator in the lead rather than second place. Lucky for us.”

  Not so lucky for the lead car. That went without saying. Andrej eyed the wreck of the touring car in front of them with grim distaste. If he had been in the car when the second mine had gone off . . . and the driver probably had been.

  “Casualties?”

  “Rough count, fourteen, sir. Six out of eight in the lead car. Five of mine who’d come up to investigate. Driver in the touring car, one of mine shot in firefight. Your man’s not quite dead yet, help’s on the way.”

  His man?

  Caleigh Samons stood up from her place of concealment on the other side of the wreck of the touring car. She didn’t do anything as rude as beckon, as vulgar as whistling. She didn’t need to. The expression of grief and distress on her face spoke more clearly than words, and carried its meaning with persuasive force.

  Andrej started for her, carrying Kaydence and Toska along with him in his wake.

  Erish Muat was seated on a curved wheel-housing blown clear of the touring car, his face clean and white, blood soaking his trouser-leg from thigh to calf. Code was cutting the fabric away from Erish’s knee as Andrej made his way toward them; oh, lovely, a furious laceration across the top of Erish’s knee, and splintered bone glistening with sickening brilliance under the emergency flares that Plugrath’s people had set up. And it was the same leg that Erish had injured chasing those Nurail sappers down the corridors of Scylla, in a race for the main guns.

  It was a nasty injury, but it was well short of threatening Erish’s life; and that left only —

  Andrej put his two hands to either side of Erish’s neck and kissed his forehead, briefly. “You are hurt, my dear.” Which Erish had doubtless noticed. “Kaydence. Have we any hope. Of finding my travel-kit, in all of this.”

  But in the turmoil of his mind, beneath his immediate focus on Erish’s pain, the calculation raced toward its grim conclusion. Here were Erish and Code. Here were Kaydence and Toska. He had seen Chief Samons. And that left only . . .

  “Sir. Joslire’s down, sir. You’ve got to see to Joslire. Your Excellency.”

  Erish knew the fear in Andrej’s heart as well as he did. Andrej didn�
�t want to slight Erish’s pain, just because of the terror that he felt — but as long as Erish understood, perhaps it would be all right, the Lieutenant had said that help would be arriving —

  Stumbling over the uneven surface in the street, Andrej struggled to where he had seen Chief Samons last.

  There was blood everywhere.

  As Andrej neared, Chief Samons rose to her feet from where she knelt beside Joslire, and almost despite himself Andrej took note of the way Joslire’s body lay upon the ground. He didn’t want to see. He knew what it meant. He couldn’t not see, couldn’t not understand; he was a doctor.

  It was Joslire.

  But he was still a doctor. He couldn’t turn the analysis off in his mind. He knew almost before he saw that there would be concussive injury to the body cavity. Trouble in breathing. Slow drowning in his own blood, as the lungs filled with fluid.

  Joslire.

  Kneeling down in the rubble at Joslire’s side, Andrej took Joslire’s right hand, rubbing the knuckles with his thumb as though to work some feeling back into a hand numbed with cold.

  “Joslire.”

  Oh, it was frightful, it was bad. Joslire lay facing up in the debris in the street with his head cradled back into a hollow of some sort, blood pooling at the hollow of his shoulder, his uniform black with it. Pooling, not overflowing, so there had been some traumatic cauterization; Joslire was not bleeding to death quickly. Slowly, yes, that, but it was the fluid in his lungs that would do for him. He had to be raised, no matter how it hurt: because the pain in his lungs would only get worse until they did.

  “S-sir.” Joslire stuttered in his pain, but as he spoke his voice got stronger. Shock was good. Shock was useful. Shock could help to insulate Joslire from his agony; if only help would come before shock killed him. “Sir. Is it. Morning. Yet. I pray it may be.”

  Morning?

  It wouldn’t be morning for nearly two shifts. They had come out at sundown, and it was the time of year when nights began to run long in Rudistal. It would be getting cold. What could Joslire mean by “morning”?