by Chris Bunch
Minnie’s was in a bad part of town, between two warring militia check points, with wandering bands of thugs practicing nefariousnesses between them.
The bar was signposted, if that was the right word, by a quadrant of lasers positioned around the closest crossroads, all of whose beams centered on a mirror outside the bar that, in turn, directed the beams in through a transom window.
If Minnie’s ever closed, no one seemed to know about it.
There were bands playing incessantly and loudly, but no one listened.
In the front room were the heavy drinkers.
In the back room were the heavy drug users.
No one bothered anyone.
Or so the sign promised.
Everyone bothered everyone.
That was the reality.
But it didn’t get physical. At least, not more than once an hour.
Riss had fallen in love with the joint because all of the incessant arguments were heated, and none of them were about anything important, at least as far as she was concerned.
Riss had seen, in her short time at Minnie’s, lifelong enmities and some interesting brawls happen over such vital points as whether Mars was settled before Earth; whether Michelangelo learned what little he knew about sculpture from the Vegans; whether war is the only thing that keeps humanity evolving; and other important matters.
No one seemed to give a damn about Alsaoud’s politics or personalities, which, after a hard day of scheming on how to make money and eternal damnation to Cerberus out of the system, was just what Riss needed.
When Jasmine and M’chel walked in, a rather large sort was wrapping his nostrils around an inhaler. He saw King, his eyes bugged out even more than the drug was already making them, and he stepped in front of her.
“Hody, sister, awrap for some cuddlin’?”
Minnie, if it was Minnie, was suddenly between them.
“First, ‘hody’ is no way to greet someone, second, this woman isn’t your sister, third she would rather cuddle a slug than someone with your breath, and fourth you’re out of here.”
The hulk looked at Minnie, and his lower lip pouted out.
“Awww …”
“Barred, barred, barred,” Minnie snarled. “For at least three days.”
Obediently, he lurched toward the exit.
“See?” Riss said, and led Jasmine to a tiny bare table somewhat drenched in beer.
• • •
A few hours later, a bit awash in beer and the brandies of Alsaoud they’d sampled as chasers, plus Jasmine’s occasional Veronica’s Revenge, they started back for the hotel.
“I think we should call Jorkens and ride back,” King said.
“It’s a wonderful night for a walk,” Riss insisted.
King shrugged and followed her out.
They’d not even gotten to the first laser when two lifters rode over the sidewalk before and after them and skidded to halts.
M’chel didn’t even have a moment to reach for one of her two hideout guns.
They were covered, front and rear, by two crew-served blasters, whose gunners kept them covered while two other types shook them efficiently down.
“Now,” one of the men said, “if you two ladies wouldn’t mind getting into the first vehicle, you may consider yourselves kidnapped.”
At least, M’chel thought a bit forlornly, feeling like an idiot for not taking Jasmine up on her suggestion of calling Jorkens, the thugs were courteous.
TWENTY-THREE
The kidnappers were not only polite, but efficient, as well.
Neither Jasmine nor M’chel was blindfolded. It wasn’t necessary.
The windows of the lifter were opaqued.
The two lifters sped along, taking several turns that M’chel was pretty sure were intended to keep them from being able to ID their destination.
Then the lifter canted down, and, from that and the echoing sound of the drive mechanism, she figured they were going underground.
The lifter braked to a stop, and the doors came open. They were in an underground garage.
Again, two men stood ready with blasters, and the pair was hustled to an elevator. Two gunnies went in first, two after the women.
Jasmine couldn’t see what floor sensor was touched.
The old-fashioned elevator lurched upward, King thought, through many floors.
She glanced at Riss to get a lead on how to play things, and was shocked and worried to see her face twisting as if fighting back tears.
The elevator stopped, and their captors pushed them out, down an expensively carpeted hall.
They stopped at a door, the entrance to an apartment that the number had been removed from, and hurried inside.
All of the windows except one had drawn blinds. That one looked out on a balcony and the city of Helleu.
Sitting at ease on a sofa were two men.
There was an upholstered bench across from them, with a table between.
One was amazingly ugly, but very expensively dressed.
The other could have been considered good-looking, if no one noticed his dead eyes. He wore what might have been a uniform, with all patches and rank badges removed.
The ugly man stood up.
“Welcome,” he said, in an educated, calm voice. “You may call me … Rabert is good enough. My colleague here can be called Aren.”
“Please sit down,” Rabert said. “Could I get you some water? Or we have tea.”
The two women obeyed.
“Tea, if you could,” Jasmine managed.
M’chel let out a wail.
“Please,” Rabert said. “Try to keep yourself under control. We’re not murderers.”
“Not unless we have to be,” Aren said softly.
“I … I can’t,” Riss said plaintively. “I’m afraid of what … what you’re going to do to us.”
One of the gunmen brought a cup of tea and set it down on the low table.
Jasmine didn’t know what had suddenly happened to Riss to make her lose control, and she offered M’chel some of her tea.
That evidently made matters worse, for M’chel grabbed Jasmine’s wrist, and let out another cry of heartbreak.
“Can’t you make her stop that?” Rabert demanded.
Jasmine, intent on something else, shook her head.
“You, woman, listen to me,” Rabert went on. “You appear to be the less out of control of the two.”
Jasmine almost giggled at that misperception, but managed to nod solemnly.
“My group grabbed the two of you because we thought you looked prosperous, and most likely have family or husbands who would pay well to have you returned.
“Undamaged, shall we say.”
A rather ghoulish smile touched Aren’s lips. Rabert went on.
“Am I correct?”
To his surprise, Jasmine now started crying, with an occasional moan.
“Goddamned weak reeds,” Rabert swore. “Would one of you answer my question — we assume you have relatives or such capable of raising a ransom, correct?”
M’chel managed a nod.
“Maybe … maybe Uncle … Uncle Baldur can raise a little money,” she faltered.
“It had better be more than a little considering how you two are dressed,” Rabert said. “We are businessmen, you know, and have a fairly high overhead.
“Both of you will appear on a fiche, which we’ll send to your uncle. Asking for, uh … a million — ”
M’chel let out an agonized wail, and Jasmine joined her.
“Very well,” Rabert said. “We’re not unreasonable. Half a million. In Alliance credits. Or a full million in Alsaoud gelders.
“No one is to go to the police or any other armed force, or else the worst can be expected to happen to both of you.
“Your uncle will have … four days … from when we deliver the fiche to …?”
“The Excelsior Hotel,” Jasmine managed. “He’s M’chel’s uncle, not mine, but he can get in
touch with my family and ask them to contribute.”
“Good,” Rabert approved.
“Let me make you aware of the options, if there are any problems. We can arrange to have your uncle receive certain bodily parts — a finger, an ear — ”
“A nipple,” Aren put in with his horrible smile.
“Yes,” Rabert said. “A nipple, if need be. My colleague has more violent tastes. If there are any serious problems after that, I shall turn one of you over to him — and to a couple of his assistants, and, with a recorder running, most unpleasant things can happen — and possibly there might be only one of you to ransom, or perhaps Aren would show a bit of mercy and allow the other to live, even if she would be damaged and unlikely to recover her full wits.
“Most unpleasant,” he repeated.
Aren licked his lips.
Both women started sobbing uncontrollably.
Rabert grimaced, got up, looked at Jasmine and M’chel disgustedly.
“Get yourselves under control,” he ordered. “I’ll have a man with the recorder come in now, and let you find your own words to ask for help. I would recommend you sound convincing. Most convincing, since your future, if any, depends on it.”
Jasmine bobbed her head, clearly terror-stricken and willing to do anything.
When M’chel had taken her hand, Riss’s fingers had pressed out — twice, until King had suddenly gotten it — in Standard Code, the letters:
B-E H-Y-S-T-E-R-I-C-A-L.
TWENTY-FOUR
“Son of a bitch,” Chas Goodnight said gently as he eyed the screen. “Come to think, sons of sixteen bitches. How did those two manage to go and get themselves kidnapped?”
“I doubt,” von Baldur said, “if they planned their evening around the event.”
Grok growled incoherently. “Of course we shan’t consider going to the police.”
“Not in this ballsed-up society, we won’t,” Goodnight said. “Too much chance of a leak — or that the cops are in the baddies’ hip pocket. And we’ll ignore the chance of a plain ol’ ordinary screwup. Do we have the money to bail ‘em out?”
“We do,” Grok said. “I can renew my loan to Star Risk that you repaid recently.”
“But that is not the most important question,” von Baldur said. “Is this ransom note to good old Uncle Baldur a setup?”
Goodnight puzzled for a moment, then got it.
“Oh. You mean, is Cerberus on to us and trying to suck us into a trap?”
“Exactly.”
“Good question,” Goodnight said. “I don’t have an answer. Not even in battle analysis mode. Grok?”
“A ploy such as this,” the giant alien said, “is certainly within their moral parameters. But I question whether they have the plain ordinary subtlety to come up with it.”
“Questions, questions,” Goodnight said irritably. “We could seriously handle some answers.”
He got up, eyed the ransom note on the screen for an instant.
“Naturally, if we tried to trace the note back, it’ll have been routed through so many servers to be totally clean.
“Do we know where the women went?”
“They signed out for a place called Minnie’s Home. From there, who knows where they might have gone,” Baldur said.
“You two hold down the fort here,” Goodnight said. “I’m going to go out and ask a few questions.”
“I suppose,” Grok said a trifle wistfully, “there is no way that I could accompany you. I have a concern for Jasmine … and M’chel as well.”
Goodnight clapped Grok on the back.
“Nope. You’re still too visible. But I’ll try to hold your end up. I don’t particularly love snatch artists.”
His grin was distinctly unpleasant.
• • •
The two women were remembered at Minnie’s Home, but no one knew where they’d gone. Goodnight did find, though, that the district was a known swarming place for Khazia’s burgeoning kidnap trade.
He went into a corner with one woman who seemed a bit knowledgeable, and credits changed hands.
Goodnight bade her good evening, and went out onto the street.
It took an hour’s strolling before he was targeted.
A single large lifter slammed to a landing beside him, and three gunmen leaped out. There was a fourth, a driver, behind the lifter’s controls.
“You’re ours,” one of them shouted, waving his gun.
“You mean, you’re mine,” Goodnight corrected, touched his cheek, and went bester.
A knuckle strike caved in the first man’s windpipe, and he gurgled down as Goodnight spun, pulled a pistol from his belt, and blew the second man’s forehead away. Another round went into the third man’s chest, and Goodnight was in the lifter’s cab and out of bester, as the mewling driver was trying to lift away.
“Yes,” Chas said. “Let’s take a nice ride. I’d like to find a nice quiet alley and ask you some questions about your trade and your associates, and whether you might have heard any interesting stories about people and their latest acquisitions.”
• • •
There was no sign on the café.
Not that there was anything that would attract customers to it anyway — at least, other than those of a certain type.
The building sat by itself in a grimy industrial section, with a large, open parking area.
The district was one where police had no reason to patrol after dark, even in teams, and many good reasons not to patrol.
It had no windows, and the interior was divided into a bar, an open central dining area, and booths where private deals could be arranged.
It was late, after midnight, but the café was crowded.
The patrons would also have discouraged trade.
Their appearance did not suggest they were the sort who traveled in honest paths, nor harbored righteous thoughts.
Goodnight slid through the door, carrying a small pack.
A burly doorman, flanked by a gunnie, stopped him.
It was that sort of joint.
“You want?”
“Nothing you have,” Goodnight assured him cheerfully. “Looking for a pair of jokers who don’t always go under the same name. One’s ugly as your mother, the other’s good-looking, in a dead-fish sort of way. Likes to pretend he’s with some sort of uniformed mob.”
“Wouldn’t tell you if they was here,” the man growled. “Don’t talk to nobody what sounds like a copper. Now, get your ass back to your precinct and tell ‘em you’re only alive ‘cause I feel generous.”
“Tsk,” Goodnight said, and kicked him in the groin.
The man yelped, bent over, and Goodnight hammer-smashed him on the back of the neck.
As the doorman collapsed, Goodnight shot his backup between the eyes with a small pistol he didn’t bother taking out of his sleeve.
The shot stilled the buzz.
“Awright,” Goodnight said, very loudly. “Party’s over.”
He scanned the room, didn’t see anyone who resembled the pair he was looking for.
Guns were coming out.
Goodnight unhurriedly reached in the pack, took out a grenade, thumbed the release and pitched it into one corner of the room, then came out with a second, threw that into the other corner, and went flat as the two grenades exploded with dull thuds.
Gas billowed through the room.
There were shouts, screams.
Goodnight stayed down until the noise stopped, then picked himself up.
He’d already inserted filter plugs in his nostrils.
The room was strewn with bodies, a few moving feebly.
Goodnight went to his first target, the bartender, rolled him on his back, knelt, and touched a syrette to his arm.
The second man was a prosperous-looking sort who’d had half a dozen underlings sitting around him.
He, too, got the antidote to the gas.
The others in the room would die, without recovering consciousness, with
in fifteen minutes.
Goodnight lifted the man he thought to be a boss sort into a sturdy chair, and secured him at wrists and ankles with plastic restraints.
“You’ll hold,” he said, as the man’s eyes flickered open.
Goodnight went back to the bartender and put him in a second chair, tied him as well.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” he said, when the barkeep showed signs of alertness.
“Now, pay close attention, because I don’t repeat myself.
“I’m looking for information on where a couple of your fellow kidnappers — don’t bother arguing with me about what you’re not — hang their hats.
“They lurk around this dive, so don’t bother lying to me that you’ve never heard of them.
“I don’t like liars.”
He noted the first man’s sneer.
“Oh, you’ll tell me,” he said, even though the man hadn’t spoken, and set his pack on a table.
“You’ll go second,” he said. “I’ll use your compatriot here as an example of my methods, not to mention listening to any skinny he might provide.
“Interesting thing,” he went on, taking some items from the pack. “No matter how much someone doesn’t want to talk, if you apply certain things to certain places — I’m talking simple things here, not drugs, which can get complicated — people become very eager to tell you what you want to know.
“Simple things,” he said. “Such as splinters under the fingernails. Or razor blades. Or an electric generator. And I could write volumes about what can be done with two or three common needles.
“It’s an interesting art, and you will find yourself cooperating with me.
“I say again my last, over.
“I really don’t like snatch artists.”
TWENTY-FIVE
“It has been four days since we sent that ransom note,” Aren said. There was a slight note of pleasure in his voice. “I’m afraid we’re going to have to offer evidence of our seriousness.”
M’chel considered the situation.
There were Aren and two guards — one with a dangling pistol, the second with a blast rifle at port arms in the room she and Jasmine had been held in.
Good enough.
Aren reached in his pocket, took out an old-fashioned spring knife, snapped it open.
