by Steve Perry
“Apparently the shooter was not a music lover,” Gramps said, but his voice was quiet, so Wink barely heard it. Probably just as well the Rajah and his people didn’t hear it.
“We believe the bird was shot to tell us something,” Ganesh said.
“What would that be?” That from Kay.
Ganesh ignored her. He looked instead at Cutter. “We recovered the projectile from the bird and examined the missile. A low-velocity anesthetic dart. Sufficient to kill the bird, but only potent enough to make a human semiconscious for a short time. They meant us to know they had not killed her. They would know the garden was covered by cameras. With the bird, that would be sufficient for us to know.”
Wink caught a whiff of Vastalimi hormone. Kay was angry, at least a little.
Ganesh caught it, too. He turned and gave Kay a cold glare. He said something almost under his breath, and Wink heard it—Karāhiyat—but didn’t recognize the term.
Kay’s claws popped out, and she grinned at Ganesh, angled her head to one side.
Not a pleasant expression, that—
“At ease, Kay,” Cutter said.
After a moment, Kay’s claws vanished. She kept watching Ganesh.
Ganesh sneered. He tried to stare Kay down, but he was wasting his time. Vastalimi had nictitating membranes that protected their eyes. She could hold that expression unblinking all day if she wanted. Humans didn’t win staring contests with Vastalimi. Plus, if the Vastalimi got tired of it, he or she could always just claw the offending eyes out...
After a bit, Ganesh glanced away.
“And there has been no call for ransom?” Jo asked.
Rama shook his head. “We have had no demands of any kind from those who took her. They are allowing us to twist in the wind.”
Jo said, “If they wanted her dead, they could have killed her right there.”
That mirrored Wink’s thought. Shoot her with something harder and leave the body.
“Unless they had worse than a clean and quick death in mind,” Ganesh said. He kept staring at Kay.
Rama hissed something at the big man, who quickly looked down at the floor.
“Your pardon, sah.”
“She is not dead,” Rama said to the others. “I would know. But those who took her will wish their parents had never met before they die!”
Jo said, “And you have no idea who might have done this?”
Ganesh shook his head. “We do not. The Rajah has enemies. Some insurgents who would change the world to suit themselves. Foolish, but enemies.”
“As do I have enemies,” Rama added. “And I will address them.” His fury was barely suppressed.
“We’ll want a list,” Jo said.
“Of course.”
After they left, headed back to their transports, Gunny walked next to Wink. She said, “That ole boy Ganesh don’t know how close he just came to leavin’ this plane.”
Wink looked at her.
“He called Kay an abomination in Hindi. Apparently she knows that tongue.”
Wink shook his head. “A xenophobe. Great.”
“Yep. He gives her any shit when Rags ain’t around? Ah wouldn’t want to be him.”
Me, neither. Around Vastalimi, it wasn’t a good idea to say such things, especially to the females. They didn’t put up with much crap. They were always willing to go to the end, win, lose, die, all the same.
Jo stepped up closer to them.
Wink had never bothered to get much in the way of augmentation, and he wasn’t running stressware, though he knew Jo was. “Was the bald asshole lying?”
Jo shook her head. “Not that I could tell. Unless he’s got better autonomic control than he does of his emotions, I didn’t get stress tweaks except when he looked at Kay. He doesn’t seem to know who took the girl by the indirect questions we asked.”
Wink said, “What of the intended? He telling the truth?”
“He hopes she’s alive, though he can’t be sure—I’m a little leery of folks who claim ESP. She could be dead. He certainly seems pissed off about it.”
“But like you said,” Wink added, “if that was the intent, they could have easily killed her. Do we know how the kidnapper got past her guards?”
“Nobody follows them around inside the palace,” Jo said. “How they got inside? Nobody seems to know that, either. There are blind spots where the cams don’t go. Didn’t see him come in, didn’t see them leave.”
“Knew what he was doin’,” Gunny said.
“Obviously.”
“So it would seem they had other plans for her,” Jo said.
“Which could mean she is still breathing,” Wink said.
“Anything is possible.”
They caught up to the others.
Cutter said, “Well, I’m going back to the ship. Might take a little nap. Get the FCV set up, put together an investigative plan. Give me a briefing when I wake up.”
Jo nodded. “Yes, sir.”
~ * ~
SEVEN
When they got the FCV rolled out and were halfway through the checklist, Jo got a call from the outlying sentry on the north road.
“Captain, we got company. J-Corps, a looie, sergeant, and four troopers, inbound in an AT roller. Should we let them pass?”
He sounded hopeful, but Jo didn’t want trouble with the GU. “Wave ‘em through and smile politely. I’ll handle it.”
“Yes, Cap.” He sounded disappointed. There was little love lost between regular and corporate military—until the regular guys came looking for a job, of course.
Kay was already outside, standing in the hard-edged shade offered by the FCV, looking at the roller coming up the road.
“GU Army vehicle approaching,” Kay said.
“I heard. Why don’t you stand there and sharpen your claws or something while I speak to them. I know it’s against your nature, but try and look dangerous.” She grinned.
Kay whickered.
The roller arrived three seconds later, top up and a cold pump blasting—Jo could feel the cool draft from three meters away when it stopped and the doors opened. The soldiers exited.
The lieutenant, a tall woman with a military buzz, slipped her compact helmet on, adjusted the lid, and gave Jo a long, cool stare before she and the sergeant ambled over.
The sergeant was male, shorter, shaped rather like a brick, and had a face that had known too many fists and maybe a few boots over too many years. Both wore tropical greens, the camo unlit, and both sported issue 12mm Hauser pistols.
There is no need to fear, the Galactic Union Army is here...
The other troops stayed by the roller, rifles slung, in parade rest. Wouldn’t take long to heat their uniforms up to the sweat point. Military-issue garb was not nearly as breathable and fashionable as the Cutters’ own boilersuits.
“Who’s in charge here?” the lieutenant said.
“For the moment, the XO would be me,” Jo said. “Captain Sims, CFI.”
The sergeant grinned but the lieutenant kept her expression flat. “Captain. I’m Lieutenant Dodd, XTJC. I was given to understand that Cutter was here.”
“Colonel Cutter is unavailable at the moment, Lieutenant.”
The sergeant looked as if he was about to speak when something caught his attention. That would be Kay, stepping out of the deep shadow into the sunshine. Her orange fur gleamed enough so Jo could see it reflected on the sergeant’s scarred face.
Nice. Perfect timing.
He had missed her. A mistake, and he knew it.
The sergeant drifted his right hand nearer the butt of his pistol.
“Lay that hand on your weapon, Sergeant, and you won’t like what it gets you.”
He looked away from Kay and at Jo’s face. “Oh, really?”
“Hosep. At ease,” Dodd said.
“We don’t have to stand here and listen to this cutthroat make idle threats, ma’am—”
Dodd said, “Seal it, Sergeant. The captain here is running m
ore augs than all of us put together, and that’s a Vastalimi less than four meters away, in case you lost your memory of how fast they can move. There are only six of us.”
He considered that. Outgunned, and he knew it. He nodded.
“We didn’t come to tussle,” Dodd said. “Only to deliver a message from Colonel Hatachi. We know why you are here. As long as you obey GU laws, we won’t have any problems. Step over the line, we come down on you like the thunderbolts of Zeus.”
Jo smiled. “Nobody is looking for trouble, Lieutenant; we’re just here to do our job.”
“Your job.” Hosep said. “That’s funny.”
Jo kept her smile in place. “Yeah, it is, kinda. Because if you’d been doing your job, probably we wouldn’t be here at all.”
Not true, it wasn’t their responsibility, but it was a good cheap shot. XTJC brought that out in her.
Whatever he might have said to that, Dodd cut him off: “That’s it. We’re done. Let’s go.”
She nodded at Jo. “Captain.”
“Lieutenant.”
They headed back to the roller, loaded in, and drove off.
Gunny drifted over from behind a stack of water barrels. “Been a while since Ah got to shoot any GU Army guys. Too bad he didn’t pull that Hauser. Time he got that tank out the holster, we could have been back in the FCV having a beer. If that old fart Gramps hasn’t drunk it all up.”
“What, you think I’m deaf in here?” came Gramps’s vox from the com.
“Why not? You blind. Let’s not even go down the road to ‘stupid.’”
He laughed.
Gunny said, “But that looie isn’t stupid, is she, Cap? She knew who you were, unless she has some way of seeing how many augs you have on board.”
Jo nodded. “Yeah. They did their homework. But as long as they stay out of our hair? No problem.”
“You think they will? Stay out of our hair?” Gunny said.
She sighed. “Do they ever?”
~ * ~
Cutter was still setting up his field office in the still-drying ferrofoam structure. Great stuff, ferrofoam. Put up a plastic mesh frame, spray it on, it hardened to a stonelike solidity in an hour. Three or four centimeters of it would stop most small-arms missiles. First thirty or forty minutes, it was pliable, easy to shape or cut. It had a harsh chemical stink until it dried, smelled like hot gun lube. A halfway decent engineer could make it into anything you needed for field ops. Unless you double-walled it, it wasn’t that good for insulation once it set, but that’s what heaters and coolers were for. It was cheap and easy to transport, and you could break it down with a chemical spray when you were done, leaving nothing but a little goo that didn’t even harm the environment all that much.
If he had any money, he’d invest in the company that made it. Beat the alternatives all to hell and gone.
Gramps stuck his head in the door. “Colonel, we got an incoming call from the kidnappers.” Before he could ask, Gramps said, “Rajah’s security hasn’t reported it to us, but we have a tap on his pipe.”
That was SOP. “Let’s hear it.”
Gramps waved a finger at his handheld.
“We have your daughter. If you wish to see her alive again, you will follow our instructions. We know about your mercenaries, and if you speak of this to them, the girl dies. We will call you again soon. Sorry about the songbird.”
The voice was synthesized, a voxbot, probably generated from text.
“I don’t suppose we got a backwalk?”
“Nossir, it’s planetweb, bounced from all over the world. They ain’t entirely foolish.”
Cutter nodded. “So they are testing to see if the Rajah is going to tell us.”
“Be my guess. Have to wonder why he’d bother hiring us if he isn’t, but you know how the clients get.”
He knew. Once the threats began, there were families that swallowed and rethought their decisions to hire recovery forces.
Gramps said, “The bit about the bird is to let us know for sure they were in the garden.”
“Yes. Or had access to the security recording.”
His com buzzed. Cutter held up one hand to caution Gramps to be quiet.
“Cutter.”
The call was on speaker: “Colonel, it is Rama here. The kidnappers have contacted us. The Rajah would like to see you when it is convenient.”
Gramps raised an eyebrow.
“On my way. Out.”
Once the connection was cut, Gramps said, “Well, I guess that answers that.”
“So it would seem. I’ll go and have a chat with him.”
~ * ~
EIGHT
Nearly an a hour after Rags left, Gunny drifted over to the op center and nodded at Gramps. “So, the colonel’s gone to see the Rajah about the kidnapper’s message?”
“Christus, this place is full of spies! How’d you know that?”
She shrugged and smiled. “Soldiers’ grapevine, Gramps, you know how it works.”
“Sure, I was there when it was invented, wasn’t I?”
“You said it, not me.”
“You were thinking it.”
“Can’t hang a woman for what she’s thinking.”
“Good thing.”
“Anything new and interesting?”
“Funny you should ask. Want to see a vid?”
“Not if it’s porn. That’s mostly what you look at, isn’t it?”
He grinned. “It is porn, sort of. But you’ll like it. Trust me.”
He waved his hand over the viewer. The holographic projection lit.
“Hot off our spy web, came in a few minutes after Rags left. It’s a recording from one of our birdshit cams. In an area called Rat’s Nest, that’s a bad section of town, just east of the Rajah’s compound.”
The view was from about four meters high. The alley was empty, save for some boxes stacked near one of the garbage intakes. The manhole-sized cover on the intake was up, the lid propped in place by what looked like a short mop. The buildings bordering the alley looked like thetic-stone overlay, probably slapped onto local wood.
After a few seconds, Kluthfem ambled into the shot.
Gunny looked at Gramps, then back at the image. Birdshit cams, so-called because of how they were deployed, angle-dropped from small robotic flappers to stick on contact, were sharp enough to gather fairly clean intel. One of the first things CFI did when it landed on a new planet was deploy “birds” to sow cams. They were motion-detecting and tracking, and this one autofocused on Kay, centering her in the view.
“You know how Kay likes to go and get the lay of the land,” Gramps said.
Gunny nodded.
Two seconds later, a large human arrived from behind Kay. He had a shaved head and a thick beard.
“Why, look at that, it’s that ole boy Ganesh. Oh, my.”
Gramps nodded.
There was no audio, and that was too bad—Gunny would love to hear what the Anandan was saying.
Kay inclined her head to the left, then the right, and the angle was such that they could see she didn’t seem to be speaking, only listening.
Kay shrugged, a gesture that meant more or less what it would done by a human.
She turned, as if to leave.
The Rajah’s security man whipped his knife out and chopped down, as if trying to split Kay’s head—
Ho—!
Kay blurred, moving too fast for Gunny to follow her moves—
—Ganesh toppled like his bones had suddenly dissolved.
“Holy shit,” Gunny said.
Kay turned and walked off. Ganesh lay unmoving on the alley floor.
“He dead?”
“Wishful thinking. Watch it again in slomo.” He waved his hand, wiggled a finger a couple of times. “One-third speed.”
This time, when the knife came out, Gunny could see that Kay had anticipated his attack and was already in motion. She jinked to the outside of Ganesh’s arm, blocked the downward cut with her right
hand, shoved his arm down, then smashed the side of his head with her left-palm heel. She slid a hair to her left, shot a strike to his throat with her right hand, catching him with a V between her thumb and other fingers. Then she stepped in, smacked his ribs with a left elbow, her right knee thudded into his groin, and she followed up with a right elbow to his nose.
