Brum-a-dum was no different. But he'd smelled worse.
Just outside the spaceport building was a small parking lot. Beyond that was a street with a luminescent walkway running along its edge. The road itself was humming with vehicles, and there were enough pedestrians that Jack didn't feel too conspicuous.
He walked another ten minutes before deciding he was alone enough to risk checking in. "Uncle Virge?" he murmured toward his left shoulder. "You there?"
"Where else would I be?" the computer's voice grumbled from the comm clip fastened to his jacket collar.
"Have you got a mark, or haven't you?" Jack asked, ignoring the sarcasm. Uncle Virge always got crabby when Jack was about to do something he didn't like. "Come on—I don't want to stay on this rock any longer than I have to."
"The chief gatekeeper has a house facing the main gate," Uncle Virge said reluctantly. "Two stories, lime green with purple trim. A popular color combination here, unfortunately."
"Don't be snobbish," Jack said. "Any other possibilities?"
"A few, but he's definitely your best bet," Uncle Virge said. "Certainly he's the most likely to have access codes stashed away at home."
And because of that, he would also probably have the best security system in town. A definite challenge, even for someone with Jack's training and experience. "Sounds good," he said, trying to hide his own misgivings about this whole thing. "What about a high-level family official?"
"We've got two possibilities on that one," Uncle Virge said. "First is a Brummga named Crampatch. He's Chief Steward, in charge of most of the household operations. Second choice is Gazen, the man in charge of the slaves themselves."
"The man?" Draycos spoke up from his usual place on Jack's right shoulder. "Do you mean a human male?"
"Isn't he clever?" Uncle Virge said with a sniff. "Those language lessons are really paying off."
Draycos's head rose off of Jack's skin, his snout bulging against the shirt and jacket as he shifted from his two-dimensional form to full 3-D. His tongue flicked out toward the comm clip—"Knock it off, Uncle Virge," Jack said quickly. The K'da was under enough pressure without Uncle Virge going out of his way to irritate him. "How was he supposed to know the Chookoock family had non-Brummgan employees?"
"Even Brummgas are smart enough to know they need help with a business this big," Uncle Virge muttered.
"Good thing, too," Jack said. The sewer-rat tricks Uncle Virgil had taught him for sneaking into other people's computers probably wouldn't work on Brummgan-designed systems. But with a human in charge of the slaves, there should be at least a couple of human-designed computers around to keep track of the paperwork.
Jack could only hope that those same computers also kept track of the Chookoock family's brisk trade in Brummgan soldiers-for-hire. "So which one do we want?" he asked Uncle Virge. "Crampatch or Gazen?"
There was a sound that might have been a sigh of resignation. "Gazen," the computer said. "Crampatch might not be smart enough to follow the logic we're going to present him."
"Fine," Jack said. "You ready to go into your Buffalo shuffle?"
"Maybe we should let you get a little closer first," Uncle Virge hedged. "We don't want to give him too much time to think."
"We don't want him in a last-minute panic, either," Jack pointed out. "Do it now."
Over the evening breeze he heard another sigh. "Whatever you say," the computerized voice said. "Here goes."
There was a series of soft clicks as he keyed the number. Jack continued walking, wondering if the Brum-a-dum phone system would be as badly run as the spaceport equipment had been.
Apparently, the Brummgas had imported their phone experts, too. There was one final click—"Yeah; talk to me," a human voice answered.
Jack caught his breath, his mind flashing back to his encounter nearly two months ago aboard the Advocatus Diaboli. The man who had ordered him to steal a metal cylinder from the starliner Star of Wonder had had a snake-like voice very much like this one. Could it be the same man?
On his right shoulder, Draycos hissed softly. "It is not him," he murmured.
Carefully, Jack let out his breath. No, it wasn't Snake Voice. But even the dragon had noticed enough similarities to wonder about it.
Or maybe it was just the personality of the man behind the voice that was coming through. A man, like Snake Voice, who cared about nothing and no one except himself.
"My name is Virgil, Mr. Gazen," Uncle Virge said. "I called to offer you a deal on a very special slave."
There was a brief pause. "How did you get this number?" Gazen demanded.
"Oh, I'm something of an expert at digging out confidential information," Uncle Virge said smoothly. "As is my partner. My former partner, I should say."
"What you should say is good-bye," Gazen said, his dark voice going even darker. "You've got three seconds to explain why I shouldn't track this call and have some Chookoock family enforcers show you why playing phone tricks on me is a really bad idea."
"By all means, go ahead and send them," Uncle Virge said. "Just make sure they're bringing money. As I said, I'm offering you a deal on a very special slave: an expert thief and safecracker."
Gazen snorted. "Sorry. I only deal in land and household slaves."
"And mercenaries," Uncle Virge reminded him. "Brummgan soldiers for hire."
There was another short pause. "So, which merc group are you connected with?" Gazen asked.
"None of them," Uncle Virge said. "But it occurred to me that a man who deals in hired guns might also be able to find a home for a boy of Jack McCoy's skills."
"A boy?"
"Only fourteen, but already one of the best in the business," Uncle Virge boasted. "I trained him myself."
"And you are the best, I suppose?" Gazen said sarcastically.
"Of course."
For a moment the line was silent. Jack kept walking, staring out into the crisscross of muted streetlights marking his way. Gazen was hovering over the bait, eyeing it and wondering if it was worth a taste. If he decided it was, they were in.
If he decided it wasn't, Jack was going to be toast. Jelly side down.
"And I'm supposed to take your word for all this," Gazen said at last.
"Not at all," Uncle Virge assured him. "I've arranged a demonstration."
"Really. What sort?"
"Your chief gatekeeper has a house across from the Chookoock estate," Uncle Virge explained. "I've sent Jack to burgle it."
"And what exactly did he steal?"
"Nothing, yet," Uncle Virge said. "I assumed you'd want to watch him in action before we discussed price."
"If he's as good as you say, why are you dumping him?"
"Because he's getting too old for what I need," Uncle Virge said. "I like to work against people's assumptions. You see a ten-year-old kid walk into a millionaire's mansion, you don't expect him to be casing the place. By the time he hits fifteen, though, people start paying attention."
"So you've decided to sell him?"
"Like you, I'm a businessman," Uncle Virge said. "I spent a lot of time and effort training this kid. Why not get all I can out of my investment?"
"Why not indeed," Gazen said dryly. "All right, I'll play along. I presume I don't have to tell you what happens if I find out you're running a scam here?"
"Not at all," Uncle Virge said. "In fact, I believe your enforcers are already gathering outside my landing bay."
"Excellent," Gazen said with satisfaction. "Brummgas are as dumb as dirt soup, but they're efficient enough with the things that matter. Where's the boy now?"
"Approaching the gatekeeper's house from the direction of the spaceport," Uncle Virge said. "But he's still at least half an hour away. Plenty of time for you to set up observers."
"His instructions?"
"To find the access codes for getting into the Chookoock estate."
There was a long, stiff silence. "Really," Gazen said at last, his voice suddenly silky smooth. "Wha
t for?"
"As I told you: a demonstration," Uncle Virge said.
"You sure you didn't have anything else in mind?" Gazen asked. His voice was still smooth, only now it was the smoothness of a bed of quicksand. "Like maybe selling any codes he happens to find?"
"If I wanted to do that, would I have called you up in advance?"
"Not unless you were stupid," Gazen conceded. But the darkness was still in his voice. "What do you want for the boy?"
"Let's make it sporting," Uncle Virge suggested. "Fifty thousand auzes, plus another ten for every minute less than half an hour that it takes him to get through the house alarms, find the gatekeeper's safe, and crack it. What do you say?"
"Fine," Gazen said. "Let's see how he does."
"Excellent," Uncle Virge said. "I'll be in touch."
There was a double click, and the connection went dead. "It appears to be working," Draycos commented.
"So far, anyway," Jack said, grimacing into the darkness. "Let's try not to disappoint him."
CHAPTER 3
The windows on the street side of the gatekeeper's house were dark when Jack arrived. It looked like everyone had already gone to bed, but he took the time to walk around the entire block first just to make sure.
All the windows were dark, all right. And at nine o'clock. "They sure roll up the walkways early around here," he muttered to Draycos as he stopped in the shadow of a bushy tree.
"Pardon?"
"They close down shop and go to bed," Jack explained, eying the gatekeeper's house. So far he hadn't seen or heard anyone, not even on his walk around the block.
But they were there. He could feel it in the prickling of his skin. Gazen and his people were watching to see just how good a thief this kid was.
And if they decided he was good enough, they would buy him.
Not hire him, like he and Uncle Virgil had sometimes been hired to break into safes. Not even indenture him, like the Whinyard's Edge mercenaries had.
They would buy him.
He shivered. On the human-controlled Internes planets, slavery had been banned long ago. But on Brum-a-dum, as well as on many other worlds in the Orion Arm, it was perfectly legal. In some places, it was even common.
He hated this, he decided suddenly. It was one thing to sit in the cozy comfort of the Essenay's dayroom concocting grand and complicated schemes. It was something else entirely to be standing here a few minutes away from becoming a slave.
Or, if he failed the test, those same few minutes away from being dead.
But he had no choice. That brief look from space had shown there was no other way into the Chookoock estate, at least not without a couple of divisions of StarForce Marines. The only way in was to be invited.
For a fourteen-year-old thief, this was the only way to get that invitation.
"What is a consular adjunct?" Draycos asked.
Jack frowned. "A what?"
"There," Draycos said, and Jack felt the dragon's tongue slide across his collarbone toward the house he was standing in front of.
He turned to look. Like the rest of the houses in the area, it had the darkened windows of a place that had shut down for the night. But on a decorative post by the front walkway was a small glowing sign:
INTERNES CONSULAR ADJUNCT
DAUGHTERS OF HARRIET TUBMAN
"You got me," Jack said, frowning at the sign. "Some kind of official Internes office, I guess. But I don't know what an adjunct is. Or what a Harriet Tubman is, either."
"Why would an Internes office be placed so close to a slave dealer's territory?" Draycos asked. It wasn't easy for a whisper to sound suspicious, but the dragon managed it without any trouble. "You told me the Internes does not condone slavery."
"It doesn't," Jack said. "Keep your voice down, will you?"
"I am sorry." The dragon didn't sound sorry, but he did lower his voice. "Could the Daughters of Harriet Tubman be a pro-slavery faction?"
"I've never heard of any pro-slavery factions in the Internes," Jack told him. "Look, can we skip this until we get back to the ship? We've got a job to do."
"Of course," Draycos said, sounding subdued. "My apologies."
"Okay." Jack turned back to the gatekeeper's house, slipping his backpack onto one shoulder and pulling out what looked like a portable music player. "Let's do it."
The house was surrounded by a modest lawn consisting of tall, cactus-like plants rising up out of a tightly meshed, clover-like ground cover. A quick scan with the sensors in the music player showed that there were no field-effect or laser-grid alarm systems guarding the surface of the lawn. It took a more cautious, step-by-step check to make sure there were no hidden tripwires or pop plates lurking underneath the clover itself.
But the lawn was clean, and he made it across without trouble. "I presume we are not going to try the front door?" Draycos murmured as Jack slunk along the side of the house toward one of the rear corners.
"Not the front door, the back door, or the side door," Jack agreed, still watching for tripwires as he edged his way along. "See that second-floor bay window up there?"
"The window that sticks out from the wall?"
"Right," Jack said. "The species profiles say that Brummgas like to soak in their bathtubs for hours at a time, staring out a window and thinking whatever deep thoughts Brummgas have at a time like that. Probably, they mostly wonder where the soap has gotten to."
"We wish to enter through his bathing room?"
"It beats going through a bedroom window and landing on someone trying to sleep," Jack pointed out, crouching down and checking his bearings. He was right under the edge of the bay window. Perfect. "I did that once," he added. "I thought he and I were going to have a joint heart attack right there."
Tucking the music player back inside his pack, he pulled out a pair of six-inch-long cylinders. Each cylinder had what looked like a suction cup at one end and a thin, four-foot-long rope wrapped around it ending in a loop-stirrup. Officially, these things were mountain-climbing tools called step-lifters, designed to help a climber work his way up smooth cliff faces.
In Jack's business—his former business, that is—they were known as bootstraps, and had been adapted for less innocent climbing purposes.
He unwrapped the ropes and got his feet snugged into the stirrups. Holding the cylinder in his left hand horizontally, he lifted it a couple of feet up the wall. The attached rope pulled his left leg up as he did so, rather like a marionette's string. He pressed the cylinder end firmly against the wall, and there was a faint hiss as the suction cup secreted quick-set glue and locked itself in place. Pulling down on the cylinder with his hand as he pushed down with the foot in the stirrup, he rose a couple of feet up the side of the wall.
Balancing on the stirrup, he lifted the cylinder in his right hand a couple of feet higher than the left-hand one and pressed it against the wall. The glue cup attached, and he again pulled himself up to its level. That left his left-hand cylinder down at about waist height. Pressing the release, he snapped the glue cup off, leaving it fastened to the wall. Another glue cup popped out of the cylinder from behind to take its place; lifting the cylinder and his left foot, he fastened it to the wall again and continued up.
The disadvantage of the bootstrap was that it left a trail of glue cups pointing straight at the thief's entry point. The saving grace was that, most of the time, Jack was long gone by the time anyone was awake enough to notice them.
The bay window consisted of small panes of plastic set into a spiderweb framework made of curved bars of metal-clad hardwood. The two outer sections of the window could be opened for ventilation, though they were currently locked shut.
There were also three separate alarms on the window. One was on each of the movable sections, guarding against unauthorized opening from the outside, while a third protected against breakage of any part of the window.
Again, no problem. A quick but careful wiring of the metal edges of the framework to another of Uncle V
irgil's gadgets, and the breakage alarm was history. From his backpack, Jack retrieved a tube of goop whose label identified it as antibiotic first-aid cream. Attaching another glue cup to a strategically located window segment, he unscrewed the tube and squeezed a thin line of the stuff around the edges.
The acid ate silently through the plastic, sending up thin tendrils of brown smoke as it went. Crinkling his nose against the stink, Jack hung onto the wall like a giant spider and waited. The acid finished its work, and Jack pulled the section free. Easing a hand inside, he disabled the alarm on the nearest window section. Then, releasing the catch, he pulled the window open and squeezed through.
As he'd predicted, he found himself easing himself down into a wide, deep bathtub designed to look and smell like a Brummgan swamp. The tub was empty, fortunately, though he made sure to hang firmly onto the edge as he crossed, in case it was still wet and slippery.
The bathroom door led, logically enough, into a bedroom. At the far end of the room, to one side of another window, was a bed built on the same scale as the bathtub. Even for a Brummga, Jack decided uneasily, this gatekeeper must be an unusually large specimen. Keeping a wary eye pointed that direction, listening for any change in the rhythm of the snoring, he stepped carefully out onto the thick bedroom carpet and began to sidle crab-style toward the bedroom door. The office and safe, he knew, would most likely be on the first floor.
"Stop," Draycos murmured in his ear.
Jack froze in midstep. "What?" he whispered back.
"There—in the carpet ahead," Draycos said, his voice so faint it couldn't have been heard more than two inches away. "A glint of metal."
Jack frowned, his foot still raised. What in the world was the dragon seeing?