I sighed. “All right. But I’m responsible for those boats and crews and I don’t like the idea of a high-risk bork area being worked by four crews unused to each other.” I pretended to think for a moment. “Look, for your safety as well as ours, why not do this instead? Pull all four of my boats and crews off—that is, let Hroyasail take over entirely from Emyasail. We’ll use your surviving Emyasail boat and the other two to fill in here. The Emyasail skipper knows the territory around here, and putting three crews from three spots into a routine trawling and protection operation is a lot safer than cargo.”
He considered my suggestion. “Makes sense,” he admitted. “In fact I’ll recommend it if you and your crews check out okay.”
My eyebrows went up. “Check out? Come on, Mr. Bogen. You’re a security man. You’ve already checked us out.”
He smiled and gave a slight shrug. “Well, yes. Your boats and crews check out nicely, I admit. You, however, are a question mark to me, Mr. Zhang. You don’t fit. You don’t quite add up to me. Your psychological profile feels funny. I have the funny feeling I should take the rest of Hroyasail and not you.”
“What! I don’t understand.”
“Don’t ask me why. It’s just a gut feeling. Still, my gut feelings are often correct. Besides, we don’t really need you, you know.”
This guy was good. I hadn’t quite counted on this and I had to make some split-second decisions on him based on risky and incomplete data.
“Look,” I said. “What do you think I am? A Confederacy spy or something? You have my old records.”
“Yes, we do. And more completely than you can believe. We find your whole personality and profile too much at variance from Qwin Zhang’s to dismiss.” Then he thought for a moment, as if wrestling with himself, while I suppressed my rising tension. Damn Security for that sex switch! First Dumonia, now the infinitely more dangerous Bogen, smelled a rat because of it.
“Tell you what,” he said at last. “I don’t know your game, Zhang, nor whether you’re who or what you say you are. But I’ll admit I’m curious—and more than curious, I’m interested. So I’m going to take a mild risk and let you come along. What throws me is that your current profiles indicate a strong, almost overriding attachment to your wife, and she to you. That’s enough of a lever for now.”
I relaxed, pleased that I hadn’t had to play any trump cards at this point and take some real risks. “When do you want us to move down?”
“Day after tomorrow,” he told me. “Brief your crews, then switch over your computer nets.” He stood up and again shook my hand. “I don’t know why, but I have the feeling this is going to be very, very interesting.”
I nodded. “Somehow I think so, too, Mr. Bogen. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a lot of work to do. I want to brief my crews this afternoon and make the adjustments with Tooker.”
“The day after tomorrow, then, at Emyasail.” And he was gone.
I sighed, and didn’t like the vibrations I got from Bogen at all. I think I knew the final step he’d taken in deciding to invite me along, and it was another one of those gut feelings. We had stared into each other’s eyes—and seen each other there. One good pro always deserves another. That would mean that he’d be out to get me, perhaps out to give me enough rope.
One against one, Bogen, I thought, feeling better than I should. With the best man winning.
Moving down was no real problem since we were taking only the gunboats and the administrative staff. The layout was similar to the one we had, except the upstairs offices weren’t in very good shape and hadn’t been used for more than storage for some time. Dylan threw herself into getting the place into at least reasonable shape, although for the first week we felt more as if we were camping out than being in familiar surroundings, cooking over a small portable stove and sleeping on a mattress on the floor. “I offered to get her some help, but she was determined to do everything herself and seemed to really enjoy it.
One major change was the large number of scanning machines you had to pass through to go just about anywhere. We all had to have new imprints taken for the benefit of the security system. I had no intention of trying that security system. I was in the big leagues here, and the schemes that had brought me to this point were no longer valid. Bogen would have me under a microscope, and I had no intention of giving him an opening unless it was on my terms. A dozen lives had already been spent getting me here; I felt a strong sense of responsibility to those innocents to do what I had been sent here to do. I owed them at least that.
Dylan suspected I had somehow engineered my way here. Hell, she more than suspected—she had worked with me before and had given me the initial information about it. Only her feeling that I would not deliberately cause the deaths of any innocents kept the peace. I had no intention of ever telling her differently.
One of the first things I had to do, though, was check the torpedoes still in the weapons warehouse against my little list of serial numbers. None of my old numbers were still there, but since we’d come down with a full load of our own in our boats I felt safe.
The stuff we ferried out to the island varied from the usual stuff—food, general electronic and maintenance supplies, that sort of thing—to major communications and computer links and lots of biolab stuff. The fact that so much was still going out, along with an occasional new face from one of the corporations, told me that Laroo wasn’t having a lot of success with Project Phoenix. Still, though I was allowed to ride the boats out to the island and back, I had not been permitted off the island dock and was closely watched at all times when I went over. The strange, futuristic structure in the center appeared even more imposing close up, but that was as near as I could get.
I kept going through everything I knew or had surmised or deduced and what I was seeing, though, and I understood the dead end I was at. Merely having access to the island dock wasn’t enough, but even if I managed to sneak in I’d be caught in short order, as would anybody else I might send.
“I’m frustrated,” I admitted to Dylan one day. “I’m at a dead end, and I can’t figure out any way to proceed. I’ve been here a year now and I’ve accomplished a great deal—but now I’m stuck. The most frustrating thing is to be this close to all of it and not be able to move.”
“You’re still bent on killing Laroo, aren’t you?” she responded. “I wish I could help you, but I couldn’t and wouldn’t. You know I can’t be a party to taking a human life.”
I nodded and squeezed her hand. “I know. Still, killing isn’t my major objective. I want to find out about those robots. I don’t like the idea of a legion of those things, all under Laroo and Bogen and perhaps the others of the Four Lords, unleashed on the Confederacy. Those things are so perfect they scare the hell out of me. If they could negate the obedience programming, that would in and of itself create a new form of life, human-looking but not at all human. Imagine such people able to think with the speed of a super-computer, literally able to control every ‘cell’ of their bodies, to give them whatever they want—the ability to fly, to survive in a vacuum, and all the rest. People like that mentally reduced to great super-computers in human form with only one drive, their own ultimate drive—power. They’d be nearly immortal, too—and if they ever did have problems or wanted a new shape or mass, they would just return here and take on a new one.”
“Surely the Confederacy could track them down and destroy them!”
“Maybe. I keep remembering that one of them got into the most absolutely secure area of the Confederacy, survived all the traps and both human and robot security personnel, and was caught and destroyed in the end only because its programming demanded that it report back to the Warden Diamond. It was basically a senior clerk! Put the best, the crookedest, the nastiest minds of the Warden Diamond in those forms and—well, Dr. Dumonia suggested that the Confederacy was fragile, continuing to be a success mostly because it had never met a real challenge to it These people alone would be a challenge. Put the
m together with a sophisticated alien culture and it could very well be the end of all we know. I’ve got to stop him, Dylan.”
“You’re sure he can do it, then? Did you ever think that maybe these aliens are advanced enough so that the tools simply aren’t available here to get around their creations?”
I thought it over. “The Four Lords’ reach goes far beyond the Warden Diamond. Although trapped here themselves, they have powerful people all over the Confederacy in their pockets.”
“But would they dare it? I mean, they know the Confederacy knows about their robots, right? And Laroo can’t risk tipping the aliens off, either, to what he’s doing. Doesn’t the fact that he’s doing the research here rather than having it carried on outside show that he doesn’t want to risk getting anybody outside involved?”
“I think you may be right,” I told her. “Okay, let’s make a few assumptions based on what we know. First, the work’s being done here. Second, despite unlimited Cerberan—and maybe Diamond—resources, and the best scientific minds around, he hasn’t been able to crack it yet. The Four Lords are also in a bind: they risk the intervention of the Confederacy, and they also are risking relations with their allies.” I leaned over and kissed her. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe they can’t solve their problem without outside help, and they can’t get that help.”
We sat there silent for a while as I considered all my options and all my possibilities. What did I know, and what didn’t I know?
I wanted to get on the island and into the project. If in fact it was a project of the Four Lords rather than just Laroo’s, as seemed likely, knocking off Laroo wouldn’t matter a bit in the long run. Bogen or somebody else in this highly organized society would simply slip in and keep things going.
So what, then, did I really want to accomplish? I wanted the project abandoned, at least for now. I wanted to be in a position to change this rotten world a little, make it more human, while at the same time protecting what was important to me. Most important, I wanted to wind up a good guy to the Cerberans, to the Four Lords, and to the Confederacy all at the same time.
The idea floated in and I grabbed it, turned it first this way, then that, then decided it was so crazy it couldn’t possibly work—just like the first one. I would have to be right on a lot of close, perhaps uncallable calls, 100 percent of the way. If I was wrong just once in this whole thing I was a dead duck.
“Dylan?”
“Yes, Qwin?”
“Suppose—now just suppose—that there was a way to put a stop to this, at least for now. Put a stop to it, cause a minor revolution that would change Cerberus to a more open and humane society, and put us on top of it?”
“You’re getting crazy again. I can see it”
I nodded. “But suppose all that was possible—and if everything worked, we would kill no one, not even Wagant Laroo?”
She laughed. “Are the odds as bad as the Tooker operation?”
“Worse. I would estimate that right up to the end, to the very last second, the odds would be five to one for discovery, double-cross, or even death. The odds of the whole thing coming off might be a hundred to one, or a thousand to one, or even worse. Depending on where and when things go wrong, it could mean anything from packing up and forgetting all about it through a really nasty judgment to death or Momrath, which is much the same thing. The risks start the moment I put the plan into operation, and after that it might not be stoppable.”
She looked at me with that puzzled fascination she’d shown in the past, a flash of the old Dylan indeed. “I know you want to do it anyway. What’s stopping you?”
I drew her to me. “You don’t know?”
She sighed. “The alternatives, I guess, should be considered. If you don’t do it, you’ll wonder about it for all time, and if anything really terrible like what you were saying qomes to pass, you’ll never forgive yourself. I’m not sure I could, either. I don’t know much about your Confederacy or what it’s like outside or even on other Warden worlds, but sometimes I think we’re the last two really true human beings around.”
“But what about you?” I responded gently. “It might be the end of all this.”
“Then it’s the end. If we continue the way we are, our relationship will be hollow anyway. I’ll have kids and they’ll be taken away, as always. And they aren’t very likely to lift my judgment, so in twenty years or so I’ll be ready for Momrath or whatever it is they do to the expendables. What kind of life is that?” She stared seriously into my eyes. “You go ahead—and if my psych blocks won’t interfere, include me in. You understand? If anything goes wrong, and it probably will, I don’t want to keep going. One big gamble for the two of us. Everything we want—or we go out together.”
I grabbed her and pulled her to me and kissed her long and hard, and we made love as if it might be the last time we would ever have the chance.
The final, the ultimate scam was about to begin.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Laroo’s Island
I walked into the dockside security office with a sense of doom, yet also with a feeling of intense excitement, as if my whole life had prepared me for this moment. Enough of the idea was necessarily left to improvisation, and knowing I was going up against the best the planet had to offer added to the challenge of it all.
The security officer was surprised to see me, since we had no shipments today, but he just nodded and looked curiously at me.
“I want you to get in touch with Security Coordinator Bogen,” I told him. “I want to see him as soon as possible.”
“Bogen’s on the island,” the man responded. “Besides, anything about security concerning you is more my problem than his.”
“No offense, but you’re too small. Besides, it’s not a breach. You’re a good cop, Hanak, but this is out of your league.”
That nettled him. “What the hell are you spouting off about, Zhang?”
“Radio Bogen and tell him I want to talk to him right away. Just do it, Hanak, will you? It won’t cost you anything.”
“He won’t see you,” he sneered back at me. “He has more important things to do.”
“If you send this message just the way I dictate it, I guarantee you I’ll not only see him, but he’ll break the galactic record to get to me.”
“So what’s this big, important message?”
“Tell him…” Here goes. “Tell him that he’ll never solve the deprogramming problem no matter how much time, money, and effort he puts in Project Phoenix. Tell him I can do it.”
Hanak stared at me. “You ain’t supposed to know about that.”
“Just send it. And let me know when he wants the meeting. I have work to do back in my office.” And with that I turned and walked out the door and back to the administrative complex. I had no doubt that Bogen would take the bait. None at all. I figured I’d hear the explosion from the office, and I wasn’t far wrong.
Just a few minutes after I’d settled back down to try and get some work done, Hanak rushed in to see me.
“Well, big shot,” he said, “I sent it out to the island and they threw a half-dozen shit fits. Bogen’s up on the satellite but he’s coming back down, personal, just like you wanted. You’re to meet him in ninety minutes.”
I nodded and grinned at him. “Where?”
“In his office in the Castle.”
“On the island?”
“What other castle is there?” He paused a moment, looking at me strangely. “You know, Zhang, you’re either the dumbest guy I ever met or the nerviest. Which are you?”
I gave him a wide, toothy grin. “Guess!”
It was harder to get up a crew on this day-off than I’d figured, but with backup and emergency services I was able to muster a gunboat crew in about half an hour, leave a note for Dylan reading simply, “It’s started,” and head for the island.
Bogen, although coming from the space station, would probably arrive before or at least at the same time as I did, assuming he left
right after sending his reply. In point of fact, his “ninety minutes” was unrealistic for me to make, short of flying over, which security really wasn’t prepared for. Even at top speed of something around seventy kilometers an hour, the boat would take almost ninety minutes just to reach the island, and we’d had a half-hour delay in starting. That was just fine with me. I liked to keep people waiting and fuming a bit—knocks them off balance and makes them somewhat emotional in a situation where I’m perfectly rational and as calm as I can be given my training.
Still, it seemed like an eternity crossing that stretch of ocean. I kept having nightmares about being attacked by a bork on the way over and having the whole thing end right there.
The crossing, though, was uneventful, and soon the shining tower of the Castle hove into view, rising eerily up out of the trees. The sky was darkening, and I could feel a slight chill that told me that rain was due. It hardly bothered me. The executioner might care what sort of day it was, but not his victim.
We pulled up to the island dock and secured quickly. I walked off and up to the security building in back.
“Zhang,” I told the duty officer. “Here to see Bogen.”
She checked a screen and nodded. “You’re cleared to his office and no other areas. Pick up your escort at the security gate.”
“Escort, huh? Well, well!” I turned and walked out, then over to the gate I’d never gone through before. I had to put on a scanner to enter. Finally it confirmed that I was me and slid open, allowing me to step into a second chamber, where the procedure was repeated. Finally a far gate opened, and I walked through, meeting two khaki-clad and very serious members of the National Police, both very large men and both heavily armed.
“Walk between us and don’t deviate from our path,” one of them ordered. I gestured for him to lead the way. As we walked along the tree-lined paths I couldnt help but notice the special security systems all over the place and the fact that just about every step we took was being closely watched by somebody. Still, we were almost to the Castle when we had to get through yet another double gate with scan, and from there we walked on into the inner courtyard.
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