by Eric Thomson
She glanced at Steiger and winked.
“You and I might have some fun before the day is out, sergeant.”
A sick feeling metastasized in the mercenary’s stomach, and she struggled to control her urge to vomit.
Decker could take care of himself, but by fingering him to maintain her cover, she’d condemned a girl whose only sin was to have been born the daughter of a separatist leader.
TWENTY-NINE
An armored militia skimmer headed for Iskellian passed Decker just outside Kaholo. It didn’t slow down, and he hoped that by hiding his face and size as best he could, they might not take an interest in him, but he knew that if they had their sensors running, they’d get a close-up of his dusty mug anyway.
He wondered what kind of place might be sheltering the girl in a small farming town that looked like it hadn’t seen any new construction since the Shrehari War. As before, all he had was an address and a few directions. His destination could be anything: brothel, abbey, or sanatorium for that matter.
There were few people about, and even the main drag was more like that of a ghost town. The colonists he did meet didn’t appear anxious to return his greeting nod, let alone his smile. It had become very warm, and he’d almost emptied his water bottle so he entered a food store to stock up. After paying for a bulb of cold juice, he stood by the shop window and took a long, satisfying sip while scanning the street for anything that might indicate someone was interested in the large, untidy stranger.
“Militia come through here often?” He asked the man busy doing nothing behind the counter.
“Yep.” He didn’t look up from his tablet.
“That why it looks like midnight in a graveyard out there?”
“Yep.”
The man didn’t sound interested in making conversation and Zack didn’t insist.
“Cheers, mate.”
He took another swig of juice and stepped back out into the sunshine, head swiveling around to make sure he hadn’t missed anything that could bite him. There might have been folks watching him from behind polarized windows. In fact, he’d be stunned if there weren’t, but he doubted the militia would be that low tech.
The thought nearly caused him to look up for an invisible drone, and he began to get a bad feeling about Kaholo. Not the town itself or the inhabitants, but the sense that he had left enough of a trail to bring the militia here, to a place that had a lot less by way of bolt holes than a city like Iskellian.
He felt an irrational longing to have Talyn or Steiger, or preferably both watching his back, but they were far away.
A small civilian skimmer came over a rise three blocks away, slowed, then turned left onto a side street. It was the first vehicle he’d seen moving about since the militia patrol car a kilometer from the town limits.
Decker tucked the half-empty bulb in his pocket. It was time to find the place where Kari might be hiding. He oriented himself and set off, senses alert; all of his training and experience told him that it was only a matter of time before the militia linked his two previous disguises to the man at the Takan farm.
His destination lay at the eastern edge of Kaholo, by a low mesa overgrown with native vegetation. It looked incongruous enough on the relatively flat river plain that he wondered whether it wasn’t the remains of another L’Taung ruin, this one blending even further into its surroundings after a hundred millennia than the ruined fortress now sheltering the rebel movement’s headquarters.
As he wound his way through alleys between increasingly dilapidated sheds and warehouses, his sixth sense began to itch. It was a bit like the feeling he got when the Sister of the Void touched his mind, but on another part of his anatomy. Whenever he had mentioned it to Talyn on previous occasions, he’d get one of her more pungently sarcastic replies.
He emerged from the shadow of a tall structure sitting precariously on the edge of a small plaza and stepped into a boarded-up doorway to examine his surroundings. The open space was overgrown by weeds and strangely shaped flowers with colors more appropriate to a house of horrors than a sunny day.
On the other side, hard up against the gloomy bulk of the mesa, there stood a large, two-story house with a discreet sign announcing its purpose. He knew then that he’d reached his destination.
The place wasn’t a brothel or an abbey, or thank God, another cloister of the Sisterhood of the Void, but the inmates might have benefited from the latter’s talents.
This part of town seemed quieter than the rest, with only an occasional cry from one of the native life forms who’d found a profitable niche among the alien invaders colonizing its habitat. A soft breeze occasionally stroked the tall ferns on the steep slopes behind the hospice, but it didn’t reach Decker’s improvised observation post, leaving him to swelter in the heat.
Though he wanted to get it over with, find out whether Kari Takan had taken refuge there and if she had, high-tail it for the mountains with her, something held him back, and until he figured out what that might be, he wasn’t going to take another step.
A sound behind him, though faint, resonated loudly in ears turned hypersensitive by the tension he felt hanging over Kaholo. He slowly turned his head to look back the way he’d come and caught a brief spasm of movement near a shed with faded red walls.
Decker’s right hand crept over his left wrist to loosen the dagger held against his forearm in a spring-loaded sheath. There were no further signs of life in the alley, but he could swear he heard muffled breathing not ten meters away.
Quietly, almost on tiptoes, his back against a wall turned leprous with age, he crept towards the shed. A soft scuffling sound confirmed his instinct. Someone was hiding just out of sight.
He flexed his left wrist, and the dagger’s hilt emerged from his sleeve, landing in the palm of his right hand. He was going to look very foolish if it was one of the town’s kids spying on the newcomer.
With a fluid movement that belied his apparent bulk, Zack turned the corner while keeping his body low, to make himself as small a target as possible. The man in nondescript civilian clothes who’d been hiding there seemed to blanch with a fright intense enough to make him forget the needler dangling from his hand.
Decker’s fist lashed out, hilt first, catching him in the middle of the sternum. He collapsed soundlessly, like a deflating balloon. Another strike against the head put him out completely.
The Marine’s eyes darted everywhere at once, searching for further threats while he rifled through the unconscious man’s pockets. His fingers closed on a militia ID wafer, and he mentally swore in every language he knew.
There was no way this one had been alone, considering he wore plain clothes instead of a bottle green uniform. That kind of cop always worked in pairs. It had to be a snatch team sent to take him in once he’d found Kari Takan for them.
Unfortunately, the man’s partner had better luck, and before Zack could turn to face the new threat, a hail of needles pierced the skin on the back of his hands and his scalp.
Then, all went dark.
**
“Sir, we’ve had to take the target down before he found the Takan girl,” the team leader reported. “He made one of the men tailing him and counter-attacked. Sergeant Golin will be fine, but he might have suffered a concussion. Yavek, Golin’s partner, had to use his needler.”
“Is the target alive?” Kozlev asked, biting back her anger. Reaming the man out over the militia radio net wouldn’t do anything for morale, and she knew from bitter experience that shit happened. It confirmed her notion that Skeen, or whatever he called himself today, was a pro.
“He’ll have a heck of a headache when he comes to in a few hours, but he’s breathing.”
Kozlev bit her lip and stared at the tactical display.
“He was almost out of town at that point,” she said. “There isn’t much left before the mesa. Tell me what you see from where the target stood before he turned on Golin.”
“Sir.” The officer moved down
the alley until he reached the edge of the plaza.
“I see one residential building, surrounded by a high wall, and a bunch of old warehouses.”
“The map says it’s a hospice.” Kozlev nodded, her earlier rage replaced by a hard smile.
“Yes, sir, that’s what the sign by the gate says.”
“She’s there. Takan is hiding in that hospice. Turn the place upside down, rip the walls open, do whatever you have to and no need to be gentle. Our man was headed there, no doubt about it.”
Kozlev turned towards Steiger.
“Your freelancing buddy isn’t all that good, is he? I can’t wait to see if he’s as tough as he looks. This will be so much fun.”
**
“What is it, Colonel?” Governor Cedeno’s pinched face betrayed his annoyance at Harend’s interruption.
“Sir, I’m pleased to report that we’ve captured not only the man who prevented us from arresting Larn Takan but also Takan’s daughter Kari. We’ll soon have a hook into the armed wing of the independence movement.”
Cedeno allowed himself a slight smile.
“Good news at last, Colonel. You’ll keep me apprised of the smallest details, yes?”
“But of course, sir. Captain Kozlev is confident that she’ll have something for us to chew on soon.”
The governor barely repressed a shudder when he heard the intelligence officer’s name.
“Make sure you do nothing that can attract the attention of the Senate or the Fleet. If either of them decides we’ve done something to warrant an investigation or God forbid, intervention, you and I will see our careers end most abruptly. The home world will not be forgiving.”
“There will be no evidence, governor. Captain Kozlev will be most careful about that.”
“I’m sure she will,” he replied in a dry tone. “Was there anything else?”
“No, sir. I shall provide you with further bulletins as events warrant.”
“Thank you, Colonel.”
Harend’s screen went black, leaving the Garonne militia’s commander to contemplate his reflection on the matte surface.
Once they had sufficient details about the separatists’ internal workings to flesh out the plan he’d been mulling over, any investigation by Commonwealth authorities would be directed at the independence movement. It would be enough to make the notion of a free Garonne wither on the vine.
If he accomplished that, he’d retire with a general’s stars, Cedeno be damned.
**
A white-faced Verrill entered the small room Corde and Talyn had commandeered for the new all-sources intelligence center and dropped into a camp chair with the sound of a dying horse.
“News has come through one of our affiliates that the militia raided the Kaholo hospice. A young woman corresponding to Kari Takan’s description was taken away, but not after several staff and patients at the facility were brutalized. Some are not expected to live. The same raid also picked up a man nearby described as large, muscular, and not recorded in the militia’s database. I’m assuming it was Decker. Otherwise, the coincidence would be too much for belief.”
The two women stared at Verrill for a few moments, aghast.
“Do we have any idea how they tracked them down?” Talyn asked.
The rebel commander shook his head.
“No, but my best guess is that your partner ran out of time. The militia’s rank and file may not be much but their intelligence team is heavily seeded with Celeste regulars, and they’re far from stupid. Since we have to assume they got a look at Decker during the escape from Takan’s farm, it’s a given that they would have eventually spotted him thanks to the surveillance cameras infesting Iskellian, whether or not he changed his appearance. Your partner isn’t the kind to pass unnoticed for very long.”
Corde, normally a very composed and gentle soul, began cursing to the point where the others looked at her in mild astonishment.
“Sorry,” she said when she’d exhausted her fund of swear words, “I needed to get that out of my system.”
“Of course. We all have those moments, honey.” Talyn gently patted her shoulder, and then looked at Verrill. “What now?”
“There’s not much we can do other than pray. We don’t have the means to raid the government precinct and get them out.”
“I supposed I should have figured as much.” She slumped back in her seat. “No criticism intended, Verrill. But Zack’s been conditioned, which means he’ll die if they probe him. He may not look like much, but I’ve grown rather fond of him.”
“Kari Takan hasn’t been conditioned,” he replied, “and though her father tells me she doesn’t know a whole lot, any good interrogator can pull things from the unconscious mind we never suspected were there.”
“And that will likely kill her.” Talyn turned to the console and called up Kozlev’s picture. “I’ve pretty much figured out that she’s Colonel Harend’s head of all things nasty: interrogation, torture, and execution. I don’t think she’ll care whether our people live or die, provided she gets everything they know.”
“I’m going to send warning,” Verrill said, rising up with a tired grimace on a face that seemed to have aged overnight. “We’ll need to evacuate a number of folks and pull back some of the forward operating bases just to be sure. The cell system usually works well enough to contain damage, but we can’t take too many chances. We’re not resilient enough yet to absorb a major setback. It’ll still hurt us. Damned militia.”
“I don’t think all is lost yet,” Talyn replied, staring at Kozlev’s dead eyes. “Zack’s been given up for dead more times than I can remember and he’s always turned up, usually after teaching the people who tried to kill him a fatal object lesson.”
“And Kari?” Verrill asked, knowing his next stop was one level down where her parents and brothers had set up housekeeping.
“Zack won’t leave without her, you can bank on that.”
“I wish I had your confidence, Hera.” Verrill shook his head wearily. “I really do. But I have to be realistic. I’ll let the operations center know that they’re to send any further information directly here. Maybe by some miracle we can figure out a way to get them back.”
**
Steiger watched helplessly while two militia troopers strapped a naked and unconscious Zack Decker into one of the interrogation chairs. The antiseptic room in the basement of militia headquarters reminded her of an operating theater designed by a madwoman, and she fought to repress a shiver of fear.
“He’ll be out for a little while yet,” Kozlev said in a conversational tone, pointing at Decker’s recumbent form on the other side of the one-way window, “and with any luck, he’ll have a killer headache when he does. It’ll help with disorientation, as you know from past experience.”
“Sure.” Steiger nodded, but before she could elaborate, the same troopers brought in a sedated woman, young with long auburn hair and an elfin face. They strapped her in a matching chair across from Zack.
“The girl should wake up any moment now. We’ll leave her to stare at him until he comes around.” A small giggle escaped Kozlev’s thin lips. “Imagine how she’ll react.”
After a short pause, she turned away and motioned Steiger to follow her.
“We have plenty of time for a meal and a glass of wine, and we’ll need to discuss technique. I’d like you to help me, but for that, we’ll need a game plan so there are no slip-ups. The big boy in there is going to require a lot more than just a bit of a scare. The girl, perhaps not so much, but why waste the chance for a bit of practice.”
**
A regiment of heavy artillery seemed to have taken up residence in Zack’s skull and was practicing mass bombardment techniques when finally came to.
Nausea washed over him, and he retched dryly, coughing until his throat felt beset by a thousand fires. He dared not open his eyes yet. The glow coming through his closed lids was enough to send shards of glass through his optical nerves.
As he tried to reconstruct the last moments before he passed out, a growing sense of horror supplanted the pain.
Kari.
It didn’t take a genius to figure out that the hospice might be one of her bolt holes. There was sweet bugger-all else around to attract his attention.
Which meant...
He forced his eyes open, only to snap them shut again when sheer agony burned through his retinas. Someone was panting like a dog that had been run over, and it took Decker a few moments to realize it was himself.
Unable to use his eyes, tied down hand and foot, he took a deep breath through his nose and tried to analyze the scents. Where he might have expected the bloody aroma of an abattoir, he only got a whiff of something vaguely medical.
That he’d landed in a militia interrogation room was not in doubt. Zack tried to relax and let his body flush out the last of the tranquilizer. He forced his breathing into a slow and steady rhythm, and that was when he realized he was not alone. Another person was breathing nearby.
This time, his lids remained open while his eyes attempted to focus on their surroundings. The chemically induced nausea was washed away the moment he caught sight of the girl strapped to a seat across from him. A sick feeling of failure filled him instead.
She was gagged, her eyes overflowing with the kind of unreasoning fear that reminded him of a trapped, badly injured animal he’d been forced to kill many years ago.
A door opened to his right, and the sound of two pairs of heels on a hard floor echoed across the white-walled room.
He couldn’t turn his head, and so he waited until the first of the new arrivals came to stand in front of him. She wore a militia uniform with captain’s stars and had a predatory expression on her face that seemed so natural she could only have been born with it. Her dark eyes seemed eerily familiar, and he felt a shiver of horror run down his spine when he made the connection.
