by Chris Bunch
Wolfe blanked the background and the jewels at her throat, and studied her face. ‘I think so. From the war?’
Cormac nodded.
‘Little bitty thing? A first looey . . . no. Captain.’
‘That’s her. She was my log officer. Rita Sidamo.’
‘Okay. I’ve got her. What’s her problem?’
‘She’s married to a shithead who won’t let her leave.’
Wolfe lifted an eyebrow. ‘No offense. But that’s a little thin these days. It’s too easy to just walk out . . . or scream for help.’
Cormac didn’t respond to that, but went on. ‘We were, well, pretty friendly for three or four months before the war ended. Against regs, naturally, but who gave a damn? It was pretty intense, actually.
‘Since the war ended so quickly, it kind of left us hanging. We weren’t sure whether we wanted to stay together, or what.
‘She took her discharge, went back to her homeworld inside the Federation. We sent a few coms back and forth, and then all of a sudden she stopped writing.’ Cormac picked up his drink, tasted it, and grimaced. He went to the cooler and came back with a beer.
‘I got over it. Or thought I did, anyway. What the hell, we all kid ourselves about things.
‘Three months ago, I got that pic and a letter. She said she had to pay someone to get it out for her.’
‘Out of where?’
‘The reason she stopped writing is that she got married. Real quick, for no good reason, she said. I guess it was because the guy was good-looking and rich.’
‘This isn’t sounding any thicker, Cormac.’
Cormac’s lips tightened. He opened his desk again, took out a microfiche, stuck it into the viewer on the desk, and spun the device until the plate was facing Wolfe
An image was onscreen:.
A man about Joshua’s size, dark-haired, harsh features, staring into the recorder lens with a challenging look.
‘His name is Jalon Kakara. He’s a merchant fleet owner. Has his own shipyard.’
Other images, starting with a tab’s screamer: BEHIND THE MASK: JALON KAKARA’S PRIVATE SINWORLD
‘He’s got his own planetoid, which he calls Nepenthe. It’s inside the Federation,’ Cormac said. ‘I don’t know about the sin part of it. But it looks pretty spectacular.’
Wolfe nodded absently, watching images flash past: a long spaceyacht; two mansions; a gleaming high office building; a domed, irregularly shaped planetoid; a spaceport with its pads about half full, all of the ships with jagged crimson streaks down their sides; laughing, richly dressed people at some sort of party; then a picture of Kakara and the woman, both wearing swimsuits, sitting on the rail of an antique hovercraft.
‘He’s a shit,’ Cormac said flatly.
‘I’ve never heard of the guy,’ Wolfe said. ‘But that doesn’t mean anything. The pics make him look rich, all right. Sorry I said what I did.’
He drank and Cormac refilled the snifter.
‘I’ve done some research. Had some friends inside the Federation get what they could on him. Kakara does most of his business from Nepenthe,’ Cormac said. ‘When he goes offworld, he has his own yacht. Actually, it’s a full-size Desdemona-type freighter he had laid down in his yards and modified to his specs.
‘Sometimes he lets Rita go along with him. But mostly, she’s stuck on Nepenthe. Especially now.’
‘I’ve known people who’d like to be stuck like that.’
‘His biggest thrill is getting in the pants of his friends’ women,’ Cormac said. ‘And he’s a hitter.’
Wolfe’s face tightened.
‘She wanted out, told him so, even managed to file divorce papers. He got to the records and blanked them. Told her she’s his, she agreed, and that settled things. Period.
‘She said he likes it better now that she’s a prisoner.’
‘Are you asking me to do something about it?’
‘No,’ Cormac said. ‘I wouldn’t do that. But I’d like you to come up with a plan for me.’
‘For you? Cormac, you’re a goddamned driver, not an op. You’re the guy who gets people like me in and out, remember? ’
Cormac stared at Wolfe. ‘Eleven years since I’ve seen her. And even before I got the letter I kept thinking about her, and feeling like a dickhead because I should’ve gone after her way back then, done something, but I didn’t. So this time I’m going to.
‘I’d already made up my mind before you showed up. When you did . . . I figured maybe I actually had a chance.’
Wolfe took a deep breath. ‘Are there kids?’
‘No. She said that was one reason things went wrong.’
‘Do you have a way of contacting her?’
‘No.’
‘So you want me to come up with a way for you to get your butt down on Nepenthe, get to her, tell her your idea, hope to Hades she wasn’t having a momentary fit of pique at the old man, and then haul ass out with your lovely like you’re a harpless Orpheus, right?’
Cormac nodded.
‘You realize you’re going to get killed pulling this stupid piece of knightly virtue, don’t you?’
Cormac shrugged.
Wolfe picked up the glass of Armagnac and drained it.
‘You are not going to like this,’ Wolfe said to Taen. ‘I’m not sure I do myself. But circumstances have altered our plans.’
THREE
‘This was a decision reached without logical consideration, ’ the Al’ar said. His neck hood was half flared.
‘No question about that,’ Wolfe agreed.
‘I have more input on our dreams of insects,’ Taen said. ‘I sense blue, I sense hazard, a danger that reaches beyond me, beyond you. That should be our immediate concern, not this person who may or may not desire to mate with your friend.’
‘Your data,’ Wolfe said dryly, still in Terran, ‘was derived from cold, logical analysis.’
‘Certainly,’ Taen said. ‘My brain has no other capabilities. ’
‘But what my brain does is . . . never mind.’
Taen’s hood slowly subsided. He stared long at Wolfe.
‘Do you remember our first meeting?’ he said, returning to Al’ar. ‘You were being tested by some Al’ar hatchlings until my presence interceded.’
‘We’ll forget that I had just busted one clown’s ribs for being so interested in tests. Go ahead.’
‘You called them cowards at the time, which there is no word for in Al’ar, because they had the sense to attack you in a group rather than singly. I did not understand the term then and am not sure I understand it now.
‘But let me tell you of another occurrence I witnessed. During the war, after my special unit was dissolved and I’d been ordered to abandon my hunt for you, I was on the command deck of one of our ships, the kind we called a Large Ship Killer. We trapped two Federation probes and disabled one’s drive unit with a long-lance striker. The second ship would have been able to escape, most likely, while we delayed to destroy the first.
‘Instead, it reset its pattern and came back almost certainly in an attempt to rescue those who were aboard the first, which any rational analysis would have determined was futile, since they were doomed. The result was we destroyed both ships and their crews.’
‘Humans do stupid things like that,’ Wolfe said.
‘Is the thought process, or rather emotional pattern, because there is no way it can be of rational derivation, which occurred to the captain of that second ship similar in any way to why you wish to aid Cormac?’
‘Possibly.’
‘Could this sort of thinking, which no Al’ar could ever comprehend, have anything to do with the fact you were defeating my people before we chose to avoid destruction and make the Crossing?’
‘Probably not,’ Wolfe said. ‘We were just lucky.’ He got up from his chair. ‘Come on, little horse. We have miles to go before we sleep.’
‘I doubt if I shall ever understand.’
‘That makes two of us
.’
Wolfe knelt in front of the Lumina, naked, his hands on his knees. The stone flared colors around the padded room. His breathing was slow, deep.
I am in the void . . . I am the void . . . there is nothing beyond, there is nothing before . . .
He lifted his hands, brought palms together, clasped them, forefinger extended.
Fire, burn, fire enter, fill, bring wisdom . . .
His breathing slowed still further.
Quite suddenly, he was ‘above’ the Lumina, ‘looking’ down at it. He moved still higher, reached the overhead, passed through it, mind giving a ‘picture’ of conduits, bare, oiled steel, then he was ‘on’ the control deck.
His breathing quickened, and he was staring at the Lumina as its colors flamed. He turned his head and unclasped his hands; the stone cooled, turned gray.
‘Well, I shall be dipped,’ he said in considerable astonishment. ‘I didn’t know -’
He broke off, centered his mind, brought control over his breathing. Once more, it slowed.
The Lumina came ‘alive,’ colors seething.
Wolfe saw nothing but the stone, nor did his perception change.
After long moments, he stood, without using his hands. The Lumina’s colors subsided.
Joshua shook his head in bewilderment, picked up the Lumina, and went toward the fresher.
‘In readiness for last jump before arrival off Garrapata,’ the ship said.
‘Stand by,’ Wolfe said. He scanned the screen once more. ‘And now we go into the Federation itself and wiggle our butts.
‘Let’s see how well it works in the real world. We want a physical transformation here, not just a spoof-job. Assume the characteristics of . . . a converted YS-class yard-boat. I bought you after the war, did most of the conversion myself. I renamed you the, umm, Otranto. Respond to any calls to that designation as well as Grayle until ordered otherwise.’
‘Understood. Stand by.’
Hydraulics hummed, and indicators on a newly installed control panel moved.
‘Conversion complete,’ the ship said.
‘Now how the hell can I take a look at . . . extrude damage-inspection recorder fifty yards, give full angle of yourself.’
‘Understood.’
After a few moments, a screen opened.
‘Damn,’ Wolfe said in some amazement. ‘I’d hardly recognize you myself. I’d say you were gorgeous, except that from your appearance I’m a pretty hamfisted makeup artist if I did the work myself. I better put a beeper on you when we land so I don’t get lost.’
‘Your friend Cormac,’ Taen said, ‘did excellent work. He is to be commended. It appears that your ship will serve us well.’
‘He’s getting his paybacks. Ship, what do you think? I remember your last programmer decided you needed more of a personality.’
‘Your statements I interpreted as showing pleasure. Therefore, I feel the same, although I know not what the term means.’
‘Grayle, meet Taen. You’d make a great pair. We’ll resurrect ENIAC to perform the ceremony. Okay, Otranto. Jump when you’re ready.’
The world shifted, turned, and Joshua tasted strange spices, felt memories come to him. Then all was normal, and the screens showed new constellations.
‘N-space exited,’ the ship reported. ‘Garrapata two E-days distant.’
The office, and the little man sitting in it, smelled of failure that’d hung on so long it’d become his best friend.
‘Here,’ he said. ‘It’s quite a package. Well worth the price I named, Mister . . . Taylor.’ The man’s nose twitched above his sparse mustache. He reminded Wolfe of a rabbit about to enter a carrot patch.
Wolfe took the microfiche, hefted it, felt it. ‘Who made the stonebucket?’
The little man tried anger, found it unfamiliar, gave it up. ‘You don’t think I did it?’
‘I know you didn’t. Not enough time, for openers. But I don’t give a damn.’
‘Okay,’ the man said. ‘It was put together by a team from DeGrasse, Hathaway. I have a way in with somebody who contracts for them now and again. I didn’t figure there was much cause for doubling the work they did. I’ve never heard anybody complain about their investigations.’ The little man hesitated, then went on. ‘Plus Kakara’s little planet isn’t that far away, and he does a lot of business here on Garrapata. He’s got a reputation. It’s hard to watch your back when there’s only one of you.’
‘Who were DeGrasse, Hathaway digging for?’
‘Don’t know. Wouldn’t ask.’
Wolfe put the fiche inside his jacket, took out bills. ‘Here’s your fee. You said you preferred cash.’
‘Who doesn’t?’
Wolfe left the tiny office, eased the door shut. Its click was the loudest sound in the dusty corridor.
Joshua stepped out of the shuttle, walked unhurriedly to a nearby dock, slipped around it, waited. No one was following after him.
He crossed back, past the shuttle station to a second dock, got into the smaller, personnel elevator, and touched its sensor. The lift went up to the deck of the oval dock. He touched the pore-sensor on the Grayle’s lock, entered.
Taen sat curled in the stand the two had welded together a day earlier in the Grayle’s tiny machine shop. A heavy blaster lay beside him, on its shelf. His eyes slid open.
‘There is a message,’ he said with no further greeting. Wolfe went up the spiral staircase to the command deck and to the com.
The screen blurred as he played back. He saw Cisco’s utterly unmemorable face.
‘I received your blurt-signal,’ the Intelligence executive said. ‘I assume you have our mutual friend. I need to meet you. It’ll do you more good than me. The situation has altered since we last spoke as regards him . . . and yourself.
‘We’ll meet on your terms, your turf. Contact me as to details through any of the usual channels. I guarantee your safety, but I know you don’t believe me.’
‘You’re right,’ Joshua said to the fading image. ‘I don’t.’
Jalon Kakara glowered at Wolfe. Joshua got up and walked around the holo, examining it closely.
‘Did you notice,’ Taen said in Terran, ‘how his eyes never quite looked into the pickup?’
‘I’ll be damned. No.’
‘Not in this image, nor in any of the others.’
‘If I believed baddies had consciences, which I don’t, I’d suspect Jalon has trouble sleeping nights.’ Wolfe went back to the controls, continued scrolling the microfiche.
‘I have a thought,’ the Al’ar said. ‘By the way. I think I should speak in Terran until we return to the Outlaw Worlds. Sound can sometimes travel much farther and arouse greater suspicion than what we see.
‘I am sorry. I am interrupting your concentration.’
‘No, you’re not,’ Wolfe said. ‘I’m just cycling this and letting my subconscious do the scheming. Go ahead.’
‘My idea was that perhaps I was wrong.’
‘An Al’ar admitting he was wrong? You were corrupted by me, and I understand why your people abandoned you.’
‘I define that as a joke and pay it no mind, nor will I allow the insult to require a response. Perhaps, in a way, we shall benefit from this idiotic side-turning away from our proper goals.’
‘In what way?’
‘Very few Al’ar ever left their own worlds and journeyed into the Federation. Possibly this is yet another reason we lost the war, since ignorance is always a weapon that turns in your hand.
‘I shall pay close attention to what transpires, since I know we will not manage to reach our goals without interference from the Federation. I must know my enemy better than any Al’ar ever did.’
‘Your enemy . . . and mine,’ Wolfe said, suddenly grim.
He touched sensors, and once more Jalon Kakara’s eyes filled with casual disdain and enmity.
‘No,’ he murmured, and touched more buttons.
The alien and the man were suddenly in the mi
ddle of a party, Kakara the center of attention. Wolfe glanced again at the woman beside him, recognized her as Rita Sidamo, but only with a part of his mind.
His eyes were held by the inaudible conversation Kakara was having with a waiter. The man’s face was nearly as white as his antique boiled shirt. Suddenly Kakara’s hand shot out, sent the servant’s tray spinning.
Kakara was shouting now, and the smaller man began trembling.
Taen began to ask something, stopped when Wolfe motioned for silence. He ran the scene once more, then again.
‘Oh, I like a bully,’ he said softly. ‘Especially on toast.’
The bar was a quiet hush, its liquor almost as old as the money it served. It even had human bartenders.
Joshua Wolfe eased into a seat not far distant from one bartender, whose dignified face suggested he would be more suited on the other side of the long polished wooden slab.
‘Your wish, sir?’
‘Armagnac, if you have it.’
‘We do. Any special label?’
‘I’m impressed,’ Wolfe said. ‘Rare enough to find any Armagnac. I’ll have Hubert Dayton.’
‘I am sorry, sir. But I doubt if you could find that anywhere but Earth. Possibly not even outside of Bas-Armagnac itself.’
‘It can be found,’ Wolfe said. ‘I’ve had it.’
‘You are lucky. I’ve never so much as tasted it. Would a Loubère be an acceptable substitute?’
‘More than acceptable. With a glass of icewater back, if you please?’
The man brought Joshua his drink in a small snifter and set a pitcher of icewater and a glass beside it. Joshua held out a bill. The barman didn’t take it.
‘You’re new to the Denbeigh,’ the bartender said. ‘I’ll present a bill when you leave. Also, this early in the afternoon I’ll have to get a note that large changed in the lobby.’
