“If I didn’t see it, I never woulda believed it,” said the orangutan, whose name was Lear.
“Well, you were never long on imagination,” said Grant.
The ape’s smile widened ever so slightly, revealing sharp canines, a threat display. “Wanna go a couple rounds?”
“Sure. ‘Course Zombie might not appreciate it if you got distracted from your errand.”
“Maybe my errand is to kick your ass.”
“Right,” Grant said. “Zombie’s so stupid that he sent you to settle a seventeen-year grudge, rather than to speak with the only starship captain willing to show his face dirtside. Is that what you’re saying, Lear?” Grant raised an eyebrow. “Are you saying that Zombie’s stupid?”
The ape’s face froze.
Someone snickered. One of the two hulks Lear had brought with him.
Grant had scored a point. He underlined it by turning away from Lear to toss back the rest of his drink.
“Let’s go see the boss,” said Lear tightly.
“He’s your boss, not mine,” said Grant.
The ape grinned. “Oh, he’s your boss too, Holtzmann. You just ain’t figured it out yet.”
Grant frowned. It looked like they were going to go a couple rounds after all.
***
The central courtyard of Government House had been built to be a small refuge of beauty in the midst of the bustle of planetary government. It had been a ten-meter by twenty rectangle, bordered by shaded walkways flanked by white marble colonnades. The central space was carpeted with a manicured lawn and dotted with lovingly tended rose bushes and the gnarled, black trunks of cherry trees. A reflecting pool shimmered in the courtyard’s center.
But that had been back when the world’s name was Hyperion.
Holtzmann had lived to see a bad part of town, a criminal culture, reach out and swallow first the city and then the world, until the planet had taken the name of its new reality.
Hole.
And now the charming little courtyard was an audience chamber for the absolute ruler of the world.
Zombie.
At first Grant didn’t see him among the crush of courtiers, the dealers and the pushers and the doxies and the muscle, most of all the muscle, soldiers everywhere, men and women bred for the most appalling kinds of violence; kinds of violence that Grant couldn’t even imagine.
Lear guided Holtzmann to the reflecting pool.
And there he saw Zombie, swimming in clear water a meter deep. Zombie was an octopus, his mantle slightly bigger than a big man’s clenched fist. Most cephalopod uplifts had been engineered from giant Pacific octopus stock, but Zombie was a blue-ringed octopus, his canary yellow skin dotted with lovely circles of royal blue. Blue rings were venomous, their bite could cause paralysis. Probably some people thought that’s where the name Zombie came from.
Grant knew better.
Zombie came to be called Zombie because his enemies were like shambling corpses, already dead.
Even if they didn’t know it yet.
The little crime lord paused in his swim, hovering mid-water, all eight legs splayed, one eye peering up at Grant.
“Captain Holtzmann,” said the octopus with a watery burble, “how good to see you after all these years.”
Grant said nothing.
A mechanical construct, a tank of water on four skittering legs, stepped into the reflecting pod. The octopus shot toward the mechanism, his legs streaming behind him. When he reached the machine, Zombie swarmed up one of the steel limbs, using the suction cups on his many legs to pull himself up until he reached the top of the tank and plopped inside, pulling the top closed after him.
“Ah, that’s better,” said Zombie. “I always feel so much better after my afternoon swim. But business must intrude, I’m afraid.”
“Yes,” said Grant, “unfortunately.”
The octopus held out an arm, pointing toward the long run of colonnades. “Shall we walk?”
It was a small courtesy. Blue rings were a tropical species, lovers of Hole’s brutal heat. But no human liked to conduct business beneath the world’s blistering sun.
Grant inclined his head in thanks.
Zombie’s retainers scrambled out of the way as the two men stepped into the shade of the walkway.
Grant joined his hands behind his back, his head bowed in silent thought. The octopus’s mechanism paced him as he strolled along the colonnades, passing elegant French doors.
The two of them were alone and for a brief flicker of time, Grant considered killing Zombie. No doubt the army of trained killers on the lawn would make short work of him should he try, but he would have gladly sacrificed himself if he could have taken Zombie out.
Unfortunately, Grant didn’t think he could kill the octopus. Zombie hadn’t become the most powerful crime lord in all of known space by being stupid or careless. Grant was sure the octopus’s mechanism was both armed and armored.
“I must confess I’m surprised to see you, my boy,” said Zombie. “We are rarely visited by starship crew.”
Grant shrugged. “I’m from here. I wanted to visit home. I thought I could do it without being noticed.”
It was a lie, but if Zombie realized it he didn’t say anything.
“Well, let’s get to it, shall we?” said the octopus. “I’d like to hire your ship.”
“That would violate the Imperial embargo.”
“Which is precisely why you can command such a substantial fee.”
Since Zombie had overthrown the local government, the world of Hole had been quarantined. Trade with the L4 colonies was still legal, but interstellar commerce with the planet itself was strictly forbidden.
The Imperium was loathe to let the cancer of Hole’s corruption spread to other worlds.
“Why offer me money at all? Why not just start cutting off body parts until I agree?”
The octopus laughed softly. “What a low opinion you have of me, Grant.” Floating in his tank, the octopus gently shook his head. “It saddens me to see such cynicism in one so young. But, for the sake of your peace of mind, I will answer your question.”
Zombie’s mechanism stopped at one of the French doors, reached up with one of its steel legs and rapped gently on a delicate pane of glass.
“The cargo I need to transport is somewhat . . . delicate. And precious. I will need your full cooperation to safely move it. And I find cooperation is hard to obtain when you cut off people’s body parts.”
The octopus laughed heartily.
And right then Radhani Shekaran stepped out of the door.
Radhani.
She was just as beautiful as Grant remembered, a hint of that lovely shape beneath a pink sari, her flawless skin the color of tea except for the vermillion bindi centered in her forehead, her long raven hair pulled back from her face, the dimples at the corner of full, red lips, and her eyes, her eyes, pools of darkness that a man could get lost in.
For a long moment Grant just stared at her.
She seemed angry. After a moment she glanced down and Grant realized she was holding something in her cupped hands.
His gaze followed hers and he received a second jolt in as many minutes.
Radhani held a device engineered to look like a pink rose.
It was one of the most valuable objects in the whole of known space.
Roses were alien artifacts, powerful relics of a horrific war waged millions of years before. Only six were known, all of them found in battle-scarred systems orbiting hot jupiters, gas giants set so close to their suns that they were practically kissing.
A rose had the power to adjust the physical constants of the universe: electromagnetic force strength, the gravitational constant, the strong nuclear force.
Lightspeed.
No one knew exactly how they worked. The prevailing theory was that the artifacts existed simultaneously between universes, giving their users access to the physics of another place. But who could say for sure? The last person
who’d tried to find out had been a researcher on a secret base on Saturn’s moon Enceladus. The outcome was that he didn’t learn anything useful and Saturn now had a new ring of dust-sized particles where Enceladus used to be.
“That can’t be real,” Grant whispered.
“It is,” said Zombie.
“But roses are only found orbiting hot jupiters.”
The octopus shook his head. “Hole—Hyperion—had an oxygen atmosphere when humanity found it, liquid-water oceans. The official line was that we’d gotten lucky.”
“It was an alien colony,” Grant whispered, “already terraformed.”
“It would seem so,” said the cephalopod.
“You want to use my ship to set a path,” Grant turned to look at Radhani. “Don’t you?”
Roses couldn’t be used to break the lightspeed barrier, but a starship carrying a rose between two star systems could impress a new lightspeed on local spacetime, essentially changing the speed limit along its course, allowing vessels to reach velocities much higher than 3 × 108 m/s.
One such path already existed between Earth and Hole, allowing rapid transit between the two worlds. That path was blockaded by the Imperium. But with a working rose, Zombie could circumvent the embargo; hell, he could go anywhere he wanted.
All he needed was a starship.
“Not a single path,” said Zombie. “Many, many paths. Be joyous, Grant, I am offering you job security. I will make you a very wealthy man.”
Grant had no doubt the octopus was telling the truth, but any wealth he earned would only be the tiniest fraction of the treasure that would accrue to Zombie. Lightspeed was bartered on the New York Stock Exchange, paths sold and bought for fabulous sums.
If Zombie could control a rose, he’d be unstoppable, and Hole’s corruption would blight all of humanity.
“Radhani,” said Grant, not quite believing any of this, not believing she would be a part of it.
But the woman he had once loved just looked back at him, her beautiful face as cold and empty as space.
***
Grant moved along the edge of the old gravel quarry where it bumped against a forest. He hugged the tree-line in case Zombie’s soldiers had planted sensors that could pick out a person in the open. A deluge of rain poured out of the black sky, pelting his face, plastering his clothes to his body, stinging his skin, running into his eyes.
Lightning cracked across the sky, incandescent light painting the clouds purple, the landscape suddenly strobed in brilliance, revealing a flat, empty pit a couple hundred meters across before the world snapped back to darkness.
In position, said Sasha over his neural implant, her voice soft in his mind.
Wait five, he said back.
There was a small pause that carried within it a hint of disapproval. Sasha had impressed upon him that five minutes was a long time, during this kind of op, a long time.
But damn it, he needed those five minutes.
Wait five mikes, aye, aye, she finally acknowledged.
Grant reached the slope at the pit’s northern edge and struggled upwards, the rocky surface giving under his weight, fist-sized stone clattering down in the darkness. There was nothing he could do. He had to go up, and fast. All he could do was hope the rain disguised the sound.
He fought his way up.
He at last reached the crown of the slope and flung himself to the ground, breathing hard, just peering up over the lip of the pit. There were no street lights, but the lone house had a few lights on, casting a yellow glow against the night and the rain, turning darkness into mere gloom.
Zircon Avenue ran parallel to the gravel pit, an old strip of cracked, sun-bleached asphalt that was a home to weeds and the brown shards of shattered beer bottles.
Beyond the road was a sprawling house just a bit too small to be called a mansion. Once it had been a grand home, but now it had fallen into disrepair, white paint peeling from cracked wood, the yard running wild, one of the maples in the back yard a leafless, black corpse, the victim of wood beetles.
Just looking at the house was enough to tighten his throat painfully. He had once loved this home. It hurt to see it this way.
Just like his world.
Grant didn’t trust himself to speak. Fortunately he didn’t have to.
Execute, he said.
Execute, aye, aye, said Sasha. Bravo, initiate jamming. Remember, boys and girls, once omnidat goes down, we lose comms. So we’re all on the clock. Good luck!
And then she fell silent as the jamming took hold.
For a moment, Grant thought of the small, quiet chimpanzee who was his second engineer. Sasha had a background in special ops, a background she never talked about. But she’d put all that aside because he’d asked her to.
And what did he owe her in return?
Loyalty to human civilization, loyalty to Hyperion, loyalty to his crew, which should he rank first?
And what of loyalty to Radhani?
Across the old road, an engine roared to life. A pair of headlights swung across the night in a tight arc and then a boxy, powerful vehicle raced away from the house, traveling way too fast on the rain-slicked road.
Security heading off to deal with the plan he’d set in motion.
Grant climbed to his feet and ran. Zircon had once been a service road and it ran past the rear of the house. He was prepared to pick the lock of the back door, but he found it open and stepped inside, dripping water across the white tile floor of what had once been the servant’s pantry.
He found Radhani sitting at a small, round table, cradling a cup of tea in her hands. She looked up when he came in, her eyes wide.
“Vat the hell are you doing here?” she demanded.
He pulled a device from his jacket pocket, the touchscreen colored green. “It’s okay, we can talk freely.”
“Do you know vat he’ll do if he finds you here?”
“I don’t care.”
Radhani snorted. “Well, you should. Zombie’s paranoia has ramped up since dey found the rose—and that’s saying someting.”
“I didn’t come here for the rose,” said Grant, “I came for you.”
She looked at him coolly for a long moment. “That’s over, Grant. It was over dee moment you left. You should know dat.”
He took a step toward her. Swallowed painfully against his tight throat. “I know, Rad,” he said softly. “I would have brought you with me if I could.”
“But dere was only enough bribe money to smuggle out family members,” she said bitterly.
Grant’s family had owned the grand house. Radhani’s family had only worked in it.
“When it all came apart, my father acted fast. There was a mob screaming for the last few shuttles, people killing for those spots. And I was fourteen. Even so, I wanted to come back for you, for your family. I fought my father, Rad. But he injected me with a sedative and I couldn’t—”
The chop of her hand cut through his words. “It doesn’t matter now,” she said. “All dat vas wery long ago.”
He swallowed. “All right, you’re right. It was long ago. But I can still get you out. I’ve engineered a hole in Zombie’s security. We have a short window.” He held out his hand to her. “Come with me now. Even if you don’t love me anymore, let me make up for that mistake all those years ago.”
She just stared at him, those beautiful, dark eyes locked on him.
“You must go now,” she said.
He blinked. He hadn’t known what he had expected, but not this. He had violated Imperial law, risked Zombie’s wrath, all to get her out. And she was just throwing it back in his face.
Anger wrenched terrible words out of him. “How can you work for him, Rad? How can you work for the man who murdered your parents?”
She exploded out of her chair, knocking the tea over, spilling it across the table. “You know nutting!” she shouted, so angry she was shaking.
Out of the corner of his eye, Grant saw motion out of the small
window that looked out on the back yard and turned just as the door opened behind him.
A very wet Lear stood behind him.
The orangutan looked startled to see Grant standing there. The two locked eyes for a moment. Then the ape turned to look at Radhani.
“Sorry for the interruption, Engineer Shekaran,” said Lear. “But we lost comms out at the palace. There might be some kind of attack. Someone trying to lift the rose.” He glanced at Grant. “I thought it would be good to make sure you were okay.”
“I’m perfectly fine, Mr. Lear. Captain Holtzmann was just visiting for old time’s sake. He vas just leaving.”
Suddenly Grant felt the terrible weight of the world in his bones. The window was closed. He had just lost the chance to win Radhani’s freedom.
“Good night, Ms. Shekaran” he said softly.
“Good bye, Mr. Holtzmann,” she said back.
Lear turned to watch Grant step out the door, grave suspicion carved into the lines of his simian face.
***
Carolina Blue was an old and careworn ship. The bulkheads of the freighter’s bridge were bare steel painted black with a decade’s worth of grime and oxidation. The diamond-pattern deck plates rattled in their frames whenever Grant ordered a full bell.
But it was still his home.
The only real home he’d had since he left Hyperion.
Grant stood next to Sasha at the engineering console, a boot tucked into an iron loop welded to the deck holding him in place. He reached down and tapped several buttons, flicked switches, realigning the engineering plant.
Switching from the port fuel pump to starboard.
Sasha looked up at him, her muzzle twisted in surprise. ‘Captain, we red-tagged the starboard plasma pu—”
Then she saw something in his face and stopped.
“Campo cleared that tag yesterday,” said Grant, his voice casual.
It was a lie and she knew it. But the half-dozen mob soldiers standing around the bridge didn’t.
Grant looked down at the board. “Did you finish the escape pod PMs like I asked?” His voice was off-handed.
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