by Steve Perry
“I would,” he said, “be better for you having been here.” He reached out to touch her shoulder, and she sat up and faced him.
“That might be the sweetest thing anybody ever said to me.” She smiled.
“But . . . ?”
“That philosopher, Lennon, he said things that people still remember eons after he said it. People go to churches and study the words of Jesu, thousands of years after he was gone, he is revered, worshiped, adored by millions. As are the Buddha, the Prophet, the Three Ameli.”
“You looking to be the next Jesu? Going to try walking on water?”
“No. But I look around and I see a lot that’s wrong with the way things are. That demonstration we saw back on your birthworld, where the cools waded into the crowd and cracked heads. The daily repression that the Confederation offers to everybody. That’s not right.”
Gently, he said, “No. But you can’t fix that.”
“Not by myself. But I could be part of the solution. Instead of turning a blind eye and being part of the problem.”
He said, “This is pretty deep stuff for a ragged old fighter. Not much I can offer to help that.”
“Don’t give me that ‘ragged-old-fighter’ crap. I just heard you say things that tell me you’ve thought about all this. Maybe what you know is exactly what people need.”
“Beating players up? I honestly don’t see how that would help the galaxy much.”
“Maybe it depends on who does the beating versus who gets beaten.”
Watching her sit there cross-legged and nude, he couldn’t help but smile. So intense. So young. So beautiful. “You sound like a revolutionary.”
She shook her head again. “No, I don’t think that’s the way to go, not now. I don’t think things have evolved enough to revolve. The wheel is stuck in the mud, and it needs to be rocked onto dry ground before it has that kind of traction.”
“Nice metaphor, but what does it mean?”
“I don’t know. Maybe entcom is the wrong way for me to be aiming. Maybe I should be thinking edcom.”
“Lot of call on the education channels for documentaries on washed-up old fighters?”
She gnawed at her lip. “I don’t know. Maybe I should find out. I—I just feel the need to do something, Mourn.”
So earnest. For a moment, he thought about it. How would it be to have a statue of you as a bird-perch somewhere a thousand years from now, with people studying your life? Because you were the axle upon which the galaxy took a turn for the better? It was a nice fantasy, but that’s all it was. You wouldn’t be there to see it.
Or maybe what they’d be doing was shuddering at the awful atrocities you committed, and using stories about you to scare children into behaving themselves properly. You wanted to be a force for good, but instead became one for evil? Like the Confed had become?
A slippery slope, that one. No risk, no gain, but no loss, either.
“Mourn? Where’d you go?”
He smiled. “Daydreaming,” he said.
“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”
“Not at all. I was just remembering another old saying. I dunno who gets the credit for it, but it’s something to the effect of ‘The journey of a thousand kilometers begins with one step.’”
She blinked at him. “What are you saying?”
“Everybody has to be somewhere, Cayne. You wanting to do good for your fellow humans is a lot better place than some you could be.”
She leaned forward. “Well, thank you, sah. And I suppose I could do some good for one of my fellow humans right here and now, hey?” She dropped her hand into his lap.
“Oh, yes. No question about that, fem . . .”
Shaw was in the office at the end of the hall on the floor they had at the hotel, dealing with stock reports when Cervo came in. He was carrying a plastic folder.
“Tell me you’ve found my fighter,” Shaw said.
“Yes, sir. He’s with a woman on a game preserve outside of town. They’ve been spending a lot of time inside a yurt, watching giant saber cats. They apparently like to, uh, do it while they watch the cats do it.”
Shaw grinned. “I don’t know what I’d do without you, Cervo.”
Shaw saw the pensive look on the big man’s face. “What else? He didn’t get stoned and break something so he can’t fight?”
“Not that we know about.”
“What is it, then?”
Cervo hesitated, and since he almost never did that, Shaw felt a twinge of worry. “What?”
“I’ve been on the White Radio with home security. About our operative killed at the port.”
Shaw waved one hand. “That? It can wait until we get home.”
“I don’t think it can,” he said. “They came up with a slate of possibles on the woman Randall’s courier went to see. Eighty-some women traveling alone arrived at the port from offworld during the time frame the courier mentioned. I got them to steganograph security cam holos of those. There’s one you need to see.”
Cervo put a low-rez hard copy flat photograph on the desk.
Shaw picked it up. A plain woman, a blonde, what—?
Then he recognized her. Jesu Christo!
Had he seen the picture without being alerted, he would have gone right past it. The woman in it seemed so different, but there was no question, once you looked carefully:
Luna Azul. She was the dowdy blonde at the port.
The implications fell on him like a collapsing wall. “Fuck,” Shaw said. Fuck!
“Yes, sir. What do you want me to do?”
Shaw sighed as he stared at the picture. Oh, she was not just good, she was outstandingly good! He thought he had picked her out at the art show, had pursued her, and she had offered him a lack of interest, had rebuffed him, intriguing him to keep after her. How clever was that?
He was extremely pissed off—and beset with a grudging admiration. She had gulled him completely! He’d never had a clue, there had never been a hint she was anything other than she seemed.
She was Confederation Intelligence, had to be. Cervo’s background checks were very thorough. The only way to fake a history as thick and rich as Azul’s? Had to be done officially. Right down to the dead brother who’d been a Flex player. She had gotten his number cold and worked it perfectly.
Damn . . .
“Boss?”
“Huh? Oh, nothing. Don’t do anything. I’ll deal with this.”
“Sir, uh . . .”
“If she had wanted to kill me, I’d be long dead by now. She didn’t get past our defenses—I invited her in the front door. I need to figure out who sent her, and why. Two can play this game.”
“Randall,” Cervo said.
“Yes. But I need to be sure.”
“What now?”
“Now, we do what we came here to do. That will give Azul something to look at and report back on, won’t it? Randall will pee himself once he hears how fast I can move.”
“Sir.”
“Oh, and Cervo? Start looking into ways that PR Randall might have a fatal accident. If Azul is his, he absolutely will not benefit from it.”
“Sir.”
After Cervo was gone, Shaw stared at the picture. Amazing how different she looked now. It wasn’t just the hair color and style, it was her whole carriage. Whoever she really was, he was going to find out.
And then what?
Normally, you deleted spies—he had done so several times over the years. Send them over to the other side, and no regrets, they knew the risks. But this woman? Ah, she was a conundrum, wasn’t she? Even as he hated her for fooling him, he admired how well she had done it. Never a false note. What a shame it would be to kill her.
He put the picture into the drawer and closed it.
What a shame it would be to kill her.
27
Azul was stunned. She had never seen anything like it. She had trained with the Confed’s best, had seen men and women who were experts in fighting, shooting, run
ning, and jumping, and none of them had ever moved like Shaw had just moved. He had literally danced a circle around the other fighter, a man his own size, and at a speed that was superhuman.
The fight had never been in question. Shaw had moved in and out at will, smashing the Flex player and avoiding hits in return. He had beaten the man down into an unconscious heap in seconds, and could have done it much faster had he not been showing off for her.
So this was what it was all about. A drug that gave you this. Shaw had created it, or had it created, and was using it to climb up the ranks of the Flex. It was new enough so that it wasn’t illegal to use. Eventually somebody would figure out what he was doing, but if Shaw hurried, he could make it to the top before that happened.
No wonder Randall wanted it. The Confed, already the dominant force in the known galaxy, would be unstoppable with soldiers tanked on this stuff.
Shaw had the martial arts moves, and he looked pretty good—when she was able to follow what he’d done—but this was his edge, and it was sharp enough to cut through steel plate—certainly other Flex players, at least.
He was sweating a lot when he came over. Cervo approached with a bottle of something that looked almost phosphorescent green, and Shaw drank most of the liquid down in a few swallows.
Some kind of nutrient solution, with electrolytes, she figured. Moving at that speed had to burn a lot of energy in a hurry.
“So, what did you think?”
She didn’t have to pretend amazement. “That was incredible. How can you move like that?”
“Clean living,” he said. He drained the rest of the drink, tossed the container to Cervo, wiped his face with a towel. “My labs have developed a kind of . . . metabolic enhancer,” he said. “Legal to use, since nobody has passed a rule against it.”
“I’m impressed.”
“Are you? Well, good. I have something else I want to try before the chem wears off. Involving you and me.” He smiled. “We can use the yurt—our friend there won’t be needing it.”
“He’s dead?”
“Well on the way. His woman has departed, and Cervo will deal with him. Come on.” He took her hand and started toward the yurt.
This should be interesting, she thought.
And it was. He was like a vibrator once he got going . . .
Afterward, she said, “Wow. Now what?”
“We’re done on this world. You mentioned Koji. Why don’t we drop by there and take in the sights? We’ll go back to the hotel, pack up, and leave. That sound okay to you?”
“Sure. Why not?”
Cervo knocked at the door a few minutes later, after another very fast session of vibratory sex. They took the flitter back to the hotel.
In her room, Azul packed her things. The cases were hauled up to the roof and loaded into the vehicle, and, in short order, they were ready to go.
Shaw and Cervo went to the roof, but Azul needed to make one more pass by the fresher first. She did that, and was heading for the lift, when one of the hotel maids came out of the office Shaw had been using, down at the end of the hall. The maid held a hard copy sheet in one hand.
“Fem?” the maid said.
“Yes?”
“M. Shaw must have forgotten this. I found it while cleaning.
She handed the sheet to Azul.
Her bodyguards were at the other end of the hall, trying to look inconspicuous. Azul glanced at the image, then handed the picture back to the woman.“Oh, this isn’t anything. Just drop it into the shredder, thanks.”
Azul smiled, but what she was thinking was, Oh, shit!
She was burned! Shaw knew!
How had he found out? When?
Was she going to make it to the yacht, or maybe take a high swan dive from the flitter into a large body of water on the way there?
This was bad. Shaw was a man who could kill with his hands and wasn’t overly disturbed by such a deed. He had dispatched at least two people she knew about, probably others. And he knew she was some kind of sub-rosa op. Very bad.
She could get to the emergency stairs pretty quick. Lose the bodyguards, and if she could make it to the lobby and outside, she could get to the local Confed HQ—she’d be safe there—Shaw wouldn’t be able to muster enough muscle to get to her once she was there, at least not in the short run, and they’d spirit her away pretty quick.
Prong it all!
That would be the thing to do. Get gone, fast!
But: How long had Shaw had that image of her? More than a few hours, and he could have already killed her a dozen ways if that was his intent. He could have poisoned her, strangled her in her sleep, and had Cervo dump her body like he had the Flex player’s. Nobody would have known she was gone, not for a long time. Maybe he was still planning to do it, but was waiting until he figured out what she wanted, who had sent her. Maybe he was going to work her, try to figure it out, then delete her. If that was the case, she had time left . . .
The smart stads said bail, right now—hit the stairs running and full out until she was clear. But she wasn’t done yet. She’d never failed a major assignment, not when it was her fault, and if she had a chance, she could still pull this off. Maybe he wasn’t even planning on taking her out.
Wouldn’t be wise to bet her life on that, but her intuition told her she was still okay, at least for now.
How long might that last?
What to do?
She smiled at the bodyguards as she headed their way.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
The steps were coming easier now, there was a natural flow to Mourn’s moves that hadn’t been there before. Now and then, he found himself reverting to a step he’d already figured out, but the good thing was that he realized it immediately—it felt wrong. When he found a new one, it felt right.
So very strange that in all the years he had trained, he had never come up with this before. Pieces of it, sure, but not a coherent system, one principle connected to the other. It seemed so simple, how could he have missed it?
The house they had rented once they reached Koji was a bungalow-style building in a quiet neighborhood of similar houses, three or four klicks out of Shtotsanato, the Holy City that nestled inside a ring of old and weathered mountains. The house was adequate, if small: one bedroom, a fresher, kitchen, a living room, but with a high wooden fence surrounding a nice-sized yard. Plenty enough room to practice his moves.
The air was warm, maybe three-quarters body temp, and it seemed to be late spring here, small plants and trees blossomed, new growth waving in gentle breezes, colorful flowers amidst the verdant leaves and needles.
Peaceful, calm, quiet. It felt like a holy place—whatever that really meant.
Mourn and Cayne had taken an airbus from the port to this suburb, though there was, he’d found, a thriving business in caravans from the port to the city for those who felt up to a two-week walk. Apparently a lot of pilgrims wanted to do that; see the sights, clear their heads, arrive in a proper contemplative mood.
When they’d arrived on the planet, Mourn had been skinmasked, with his ears altered by bits of synthetic flesh, too. Along with using one of his fake identities, he figured it should keep him from being found, at least long enough for him to finish his work.
The city itself was rather small—probably three or four hundred thousand people, laid out for foot or cycle traffic as much as it was for wheeled or air-cushion vehicles. Open, broad, a lot of smiling folk, many of them dressed in religious garb—ranging from loincloths to enveloping robes, hues from black and somber to flaming red or orange. A city, an entire world, of pilgrims, come to seek and maybe find something beyond themselves.
In the cottage, Cayne worked on her editing. Outside in the clean light of the warm day, Mourn trained. It felt very comfortable, as if they had been doing it for years and had grown into it together. Like an old mated couple, secure in their own intersecting orbits . . .
As Mourn took the eighty-ninth step of his new dan
ce, he had a sudden vision of himself bumping into Weems. A few months ago, the result of such a meeting would have been easy to predict: Weems would’ve creamed him. Exactly what went down on Earth when that meeting had happened.
Mourn had been defeated before he made his first move.
But now? Even now, he wasn’t sure he had all the moves he might need, but Mourn knew he had some of them, maybe most of them, and if he and Weems went at it? Maybe he could run with Primero and not fall down. He had something new, and against a pretty good player, it had worked a lot better than he’d expected. What worked against one could be made to work against another.
He imagined himself standing over a defeated Weems . . .
He lost his balance and fell out of the step. Grinned at himself. Well, it sure wasn’t gonna work if he didn’t keep himself focused on it . . .
He backed up five steps and began the sequence again. Concentrate, Mourn. You got something here. Finish it up, smooth it out, who knows what you might be able to do with it?
The monkey brain wasn’t giving up so easily. It kept chattering: Beat Weems, and you take his place. Number One. Primero. What you’ve always wanted!
A happy thought. And, having achieved your life’s goal, you run into Cayne’s viper-in-the-garden: Then what? When you reach the top of the heap, where do you go from there?
He missed the eighty-ninth step again.
Crap!
Sola sat at the console, watching the images of fights blur past. “Play normal speed,” she said.
The fighting slowed.
She’d had an idea when she had started the project, a pretty solid one, of how it would go, what she wanted to accomplish. Early on, that had remained clear, and the footage of combat and the interviews had flowed toward her goal. A general overview of the Musashi Flex, how it worked, who the major players were, then more specifics to illuminate answers to the ever-basic questions: who, where, what, when, why, and how.
