Visitor: A Foreigner Novel

by C. J. Cherryh

  “Excellently done,” Lord Geigi said warmly, in ship-speak. “Welcome, Gin-nandi.”

  Geigi knew a little human language—not unnaturally, he had more of a ship-speak accent than Mosphei’, and he scrambled two accents and a language inside five words, but he managed.

  Never in the history of the station had the atevi stationmaster and the Mospheiran stationmaster exchanged impromptu words in each other’s languages. Habitually, handoff had been a simple, prearranged series of button-pushes and button-push acknowledgments.

  It was a psychological change in their offices, a change in very many ways.

  The techs looked a little surprised, but not at all unhappy, and Geigi finished with, “Thank you, Gin-nandi,” in mixed ship-speak and Ragi.

  “One is pleased, nandi,” Gin’s voice answered, in Ragi. “Thank you.”

  And it was done. Atevi techs slid back chairs, relieved, after shift and shift and shift, hours on, and hours off only to snatch food and sleep a little.

  “We shall keep the regular rotation from now on,” Geigi said. “Honor to you all, nadiin-ji. You have done extravagantly well, and I shall list all my staff for the aiji-dowager’s personal remembrance. Go. Shut down now. We are resuming regular schedule in all respects. You will return at the official time.”

  There were happy expressions, tired people contemplating a meal and bed, and a decent time to rest before the shift came back to them.

  “The dowager bids me say,” Bren said quietly to Geigi, “that you are to rest, yourself, and that when you have leisure she will be pleased to see you, Geigi-ji. Your apartment right now is full of humans, both children and parents, and should you wish to take your hours of rest in my small guest quarters, you would be very welcome.”

  “One is grateful,” Geigi said, “But my staff will shield me, and I should pay respects to my guests, however briefly.”

  “I have one favor to ask in the meanwhile, Geigi-ji. I wish access to Braddock.”

  “Jase-aiji sends word that Ogun requests him sent to their security. I have referred the question to the dowager.”

  “The dowager has referred it to me,” he said, which was the truth. Do as you see fit had been Ilisidi’s word on that matter, in essence. And he had not communicated with Jase to give an official schedule, not yet.

  “Indeed.” Geigi gave a little nod. “Then, Bren-ji, I shall walk with you toward our unwilling guests. Then I shall leave matters completely to you, whatever you do with Braddock and his associates. We have attempted to make the woman in particular comfortable, since her daughter is a guest and under the aiji’s protection; but she remains quite angry and defiant toward us.”

  One took notes on that, certainly.

  “We have kept all of them separate from each other,” Geigi said. “Two of them have thrown bedding onto the floor and one has attempted to dismantle the plumbing. We would be quite glad to send all of them to Ogun-aiji. But we are not glad, for the child’s sake.”

  “I shall call on the woman first, then,” Bren said. “I shall at least make an effort.”

  “One wishes you success,” Geigi said as they walked the hall.

  Calling on Irene’s mother was what he had sworn he wouldn’t do. Braddock might have necessary information. Braddock—knew things he might want to know. He had no reason to believe Irene’s mother was in any sense well-placed in Braddock’s counsels. He had sworn not to be distracted by the children’s situation.

  But—one couldn’t take the woman for granted, either. What her credentials were, who she actually was, what her connections had been, he had declined to ask Irene, and it was doubtful they’d get much from what personnel records Sabin had managed to extract from Reunion records before destroying the station’s memory banks.

  Sabin’s people had spent much of the voyage going over what they’d gotten, looking primarily for information on their more troublesome passengers, and details regarding all contact with the kyo.

  The Reunion citizen rolls, as it turned out, proved uninformative at best. They hadn’t gotten their judicial files, hadn’t gotten their educational records, or their council records, and the personal files they had were fragmentary, covering individuals a hundred years deceased more thoroughly than the survivors, giving them little to no information on a significant number of persons they’d taken aboard.

  In an attempt to build their own files, they’d conducted interviews during the voyage. The problem was, any random person among the survivors could claim to be a nuclear physicist, a trained mechanic, or a medical doctor, with no proof to the contrary, necessitating an exhaustive system of cross-checks. If the interviewers had gotten three unrelated Reunioners to swear to a claim, it was indicated to be truthful—pending the individual’s performance on an ever-expanding series of tests. A few individuals had had the foresight to bring actual records and badges with them—or company documents and research, as Andressen had done; but most had crammed necessities and sentimental items into what they could carry, and boarded in extreme haste.

  Braddock . . . was Braddock. He was indisputably what he had been, and, also indisputably, not what he still wanted to be. Head of the ancient Pilots’ Guild, at odds with the ship’s officers, bent on becoming master of some station—he’d been campaigning to be given resources to build a new station, but Mospheirans, who had a centuries-old feud with the Reunioners’ ancestors, were worried about Braddock’s leading a riot and taking over the human side of the station, a fear Tillington had done nothing to settle. It was that fear, in fact, which had prompted Tillington to slam the section doors shut at the first remotely justifiable opportunity.

  Hostage leverage—much as Braddock had used against the kyo for six years.

  That . . . was the one thing they knew regarding Reunion’s interactions with the kyo. According to Jase’s report, no information relating to either kyo incident had turned up in those records. One feared those details had been buried in levels they hadn’t been able to lift, in their haste to destroy all records from which the kyo might extract information.

  Braddock had been in charge of the station from long before the kyo’s initial attack. It would appear Braddock had buried all files associated with the kyo deep into some archive only he could access. If those records existed at all, they were on Reunion. Presumably Reunion no longer existed. But that was not guaranteed: the kyo might still be going through it for small bits and clues, itself a worrying proposition.

  Braddock . . . was Braddock. And Braddock, from current evidence, had never ceased being Braddock. Whether the kyo’s arrival or that lockdown had initiated them, riots and looting had indeed begun, and there was some evidence that Braddock had already been plotting a breakout, and had already had a notion of using the kids, who were under Tabini-aiji’s protection, as currency in the bargaining.

  If Braddock hadn’t personally and willfully triggered those riots, he’d certainly been preparing to take advantage of them, once they began.

  Irene’s mother? He hadn’t asked Irene too closely about her mother’s involvement with Braddock and Braddock’s lieutenants—who, well before the lockdown, had repositioned themselves to her apartment and the one adjacent—apartments which not only contained one of Braddock’s intended hostages, but also just happened to be within shouting distance of the section doors, the thin line that held Reunioners out of the sensitive spots of the station.

  Braddock had, according to Irene, moved into the apartment next door, but he’d spent nights in her mother’s apartment. He suspected it wasn’t an unwilling relationship. Jase had warned him about the connection when the kids had come down to the planet.

  He certainly hadn’t wanted to put any pressure on Irene, but if he did send Braddock and his lieutenants to Ogun for prosecution . . . did he include Irene’s mother in that package? Or did he establish some special status for her?

  Did he try to reunite Irene with her mother, and include her in the plan to take the children and their families do
wn to the planet?

  Not enthusiastically. No. He didn’t.

  He didn’t want to be in a position to decide that question. He didn’t know what was right. But he also had to consider that woman’s child had been invited to come under the dowager’s roof, under the dowager’s personal protection, with all the politics and prestige that went with it.

  So he headed now toward the very interview he’d most wanted to avoid and maybe, just maybe, he’d learn something useful—before he talked to Braddock.

  • • •

  It was not Guild who stood watch over the Reunioner prisoners: it was Geigi’s own non-Guild security, individuals who simply stood there to lock what needed locking and to settle small disputes. Such regular security would still be able to deal with a great number of situations once the Guild itself moved in, as the Guild was in process of doing. And they were adequate for what needed doing now. They saw to it that Ms. Williams and the others were fed, gave them clean clothes—and made certain they didn’t have contact with each other, or do harm to themselves or others.

  Which meant, as it turned out, that they kept them in separate small rooms in what was by design a small and little-used detention facility. They fed them three times daily, and simply kept the doors shut.

  Was there danger of an escape? Not likely. There was nowhere to go, on this side of the station. Argument, with no commonality of language, was not going to affect the atevi guards in any way. And atevi being generally a head and shoulders taller, and commensurately stronger—physical force was no threat, either.

  Ms. Williams, by the empty tray that passed him as he approached, was awake . . . and in good appetite.

  He knocked as simple warning on the door before security unlocked it, and found Ms. Williams sitting glumly on her atevi-scale cot, which was all the furniture the barren room afforded, besides a sink and an accommodation.

  He walked in. Banichi and Jago took up position on either side of the open door, while Tano and Algini stayed outside with the regular guards.

  She glanced up, stared, then got up in a hurry. “Help me,” she said, breathlessly, desperate. “Please . . . help me.”

  “I’d like to, Ms. Williams.” Tell her that her daughter was safe? The woman had never yet asked about her daughter, that he had ever heard. “But you’ve landed yourself in some difficulty.”

  “I’ve done nothing. I’ve been taken captive and held here for no reason—”

  “You’re being held, Ms. Williams, because there are some serious questions about your associations, and the part you played in their actions.”

  “I’ve done nothing. I’ll tell you anything you want to know!”

  “Then we should get along quite well. To start with, can you explain what Mr. Braddock was doing in your apartment, or why you refused to help Mr. Andressen find his son, or even just to tell him you didn’t know?”

  A rather blank blink. The second might not be the question she expected, perhaps. The first—quite likely.

  “I—I had no choice.”

  “Explain.”

  Nervous flutter of the hands about her person, straightening her shirt. Actions instinctual, but not without intent. Ms. Williams was a beautiful woman, dark-skinned, dark-eyed, on the young side of thirty, with appeal in every line of her—human moves, setting off human instincts.

  He lived in the habit of suspicion. He lived, he thought, because of his habit of suspicion. And he was not moved to think better of her for that manipulative body language.

  Was there going to be an explanation? He waited. He simply waited.

  “I was seeing Theo Verner. And Braddock . . . Braddock just showed up at the door and Theo let him in and said he had to stay because security was hunting for him.”

  “Go on.” He wasn’t going to give her leading questions, to help her shape her story. He just waited. And listened.

  “So. So they moved in. And Theo stayed. And Braddock went next door, I think.”

  Not quite how Irene had described the living situation, but plausible. He still waited.

  She twitched, uneasy with his lack of response. “Who are you?” she asked, somewhat belatedly, and without the breathless quiver. “How do I know you can help me?”

  “Braddock, Ms. Williams. Go on.”

  And bit her full lower lip. Then, a bit sullenly: “There wasn’t anything I could do. He was just there.”

  Innocent victim, was she? For Irene’s sake, he so wished that rang true.

  “So?”

  “So these atevi came in with ship security and took us out into the tunnels, with no coats, nothing, and Captain Graham, he was in charge, he kept asking Lou questions.”

  Interesting. Lou, now. Not Braddock.

  “I told him, told Captain Graham I wasn’t part of it. Told him I was freezing to death, and he just handed me over to the atevi with the others and they brought us here.”

  “Where you’re not freezing.”

  “I’m shut in this room and I can’t talk to anybody!”

  “That’s sad, Ms. Williams. Is that all I need to know?”

  She’d wound up to tears. They glistened in her eyes. They’d been glistening for some time. Then, like the flipping of a switch, thought took over—or tactics changed.

  “You’re from the planet,” she said, voice and body turning overtly respectful. “You’re the one that was coming—the one they were talking about.”

  “If I were?”

  Would the tears fall? Would she finally ask, Where’s my daughter? Would she say, I’ve been afraid to ask that? I’ve tried to ask that?

  “You’re with them. You’re Cameron. You can help me, can’t you?”

  Evidently she wasn’t going to.

  “We can dispense with the tears, Ms. Williams. I’m immune. What were you doing with . . . Lou?”

  Blink. Realization, maybe. And the tears vanished. The face was frozen, thoughts flickering fast in the look.

  “I’m waiting,” he said.

  “What do you want?”

  “What do you suppose I want?”

  Hesitation, then. A slow intake of breath. A complete change of body language, from pity-me to reestimation.

  Bren just stood there. Waited.

  “Look. Look. I did what I had to do. I tried. I tried to stay alive. I did what I had to do.”

  “What was that, Ms. Williams? What did you have to do?”

  Deep breath. Arms folded. Jaw set. “I don’t know anything.”

  “What sort of thing would you not know, Ms. Williams?”

  “Oh. Hell.”

  “You’re in fairly deep. What do you expect us to do?”

  Chin trembled. A little. He was almost inclined to believe it. “I don’t know. I don’t have a clue.”

  Almost.

  “You know the depth of the game you’re in. I understand you better than you might think. So let me advise you—you haven’t got any better offers. You won’t find any better than I can give you. And if you ever try to double on me, you’ll have lost your last best offer. So I’m asking again. What’s your relationship to Braddock?”

  “Where’s my daughter?”

  He didn’t let his face react. His aishid might read him. He didn’t think Ms. Williams could. “Your daughter.”

  “My daughter. My daughter, who stole my keycard and skipped out into the tunnels. You know where she is.”

  Just a little edge to that question. And what happened to be a wrong conclusion. Irene hadn’t escaped into the tunnels. She’d walked out the section door personnel access, escorted by armored ship security. “She’s safe,” he said.

  Deep, deep breath. A little shaky, in that reaction. So perhaps there was a modicum of concern.

  “Why did you let Braddock in? Why did you let him set up operations in your apartment? Why did you let him lock your daughter in? What is your involvement? This is a test.”

  The answer took a second. “I let him in because he wanted in. Because he wanted to operat
e near the doors. I don’t know what he had set up, except Theo was running messages from there. I protected my daughter.”

  “I’m interested in your logic.”

  “I worked for Lou. Have for several years. I knew him socially. I survived the first attack on Reunion. I was pregnant. The father was dead. Half the people I knew were dead. I helped Lou set things up, get admin together— When Irene was born I set her on a pallet in the corner, and then went back to my station. I was trying to find people, find equipment, find supplies—I slept there, I ate there, I worked, and I put things together, and all the while we never knew but what that ship would come back and finish us. But we kept trying. And I kept us alive. Then they finally did come back. They came in, and we got that one hostage, and they went away. They didn’t come back. And we just held on.”

  Not a tear. Not a wobble. But the woman wasn’t lying now, he had that strong feeling.

  “When everything settled, the first time, Lou—Braddock—gave me a place. With my daughter. Yes, we had a relationship. Off and on. It was what there was. We lived all right. I was—I was all right. We were doing fine. Others—not so well, maybe. But what do they say? ‘Dead help is no help’? We had to stay alive. We were keeping admin running. We had to keep the station running.”

  “You had a kyo ship sitting there watching you.”

  “We didn’t know that.”

  “So you weren’t doing that well after all, were you?”

  “We were feeding ourselves. We were rebuilding. It was getting better. When Phoenix showed up and said we had to leave, and get on board . . . we were scared, was all. We were scared. Lou said they’d hit us if we moved. They’d track us to the other station. They’d do the same thing. They’d wipe us out. And he was right, wasn’t he? Now they’re here. They’ve followed us.”

  It was a reasonable interpretation, given gaps in understanding.

  “Can you describe the attack?”

  “Which one? There were two. I was asleep when the first came.”