“Can I get into the system yet, Era?”
“Jo. Hi. Sure. Funny. You don’t look any different.”
“What?”
“I thought you might have a mystic glow now that you’re an officer.”
“Shit. You’re all going to get cute, aren’t you?”
“Sure. Want to watch something you’ll never see again?”
“What?”
“XXVIII Fretensis heading out.”
She joined Vadja at a viewscreen. XXVIII Fretensis was just leaving the Barbican. It was impressive.
“Good hunting, guys,” Vadja said. He had worked up a definite dislike for Messenger’s species.
“There you are.” Jo dropped a sheet of hard copy in front of Haget. “You said the ten most likely departures so I got you ten, but if they didn’t go out on one of the first three you can have my comet.”
“Why so sure?”
“All three were docked in the same section. The ship from Starbase docked in the next section. They all left within ten hours. And the Barbican had false alarms on its intruder watch there at the right time. STASIS decided there was a self-correcting glitch or a rodent off one of the Horigawas.”
“All Haulers. What do you think, Smokey?” The Traveler’s Chief’s name was Hide Yoreyoshi but he insisted on Smokey.
“Ore carriers, Colonel. They bring in metal billets.”
“Why the intermediate stops?”
“Picking up special order stuff.”
“If you were the fugitives which Hauler would you have taken?”
“They were flying blind, Colonel. Probably whichever had the sloppiest dockside security.”
Haget grunted, stared at the sheet. “Anybody think of a reason the Ku wouldn’t get off the Hauler first chance he got?”
Nobody offered one.
Haget circled each of the first three stops. “There’s our itinerary, Smokey. If we don’t find anything, I’ll spank the Lieutenant and we’ll think of something else.”
Jo snorted. She knew she had this step of the search in a lock.
— 75 —
Lupo Provik gazed out his office window, at a level with Tregesser Horata High City. He saw nothing that pleased him. “What is she doing up there?”
Four said, “Still no word.”
“Doesn’t she realize how much mischief the Directors can do? Especially now?”
Blessed’s Voyager had broken off the Web two hours ago. Lupo and the family had gathered to await Two’s report.
Three said, “What’s Two waiting for?”
Four asked, “Blessed wouldn’t have neutralized her, would he?”
“No,” Lupo said. “We won’t catch him in that kind of mistake.”
One had been on station since yesterday, waiting to escort the crown prince.
Five and Six had comm duty. Six said, “Stop fussing. Two is on.”
They clustered as Two took shape. Lupo felt mildly foolish. He should have suspected she was waiting to get close enough to send holosignals. She asked, “Am I coming through?”
“Perfectly,” Lupo replied. “Got anything interesting?”
“Blessed is making a show of model behavior. For now. Main point is that though he took only three people out to M. Shrilica, he’s bringing eight back.”
Two vanished. Holoportraits replaced her. “Cable Shike. Nyo Bofoku. Tina Bofoku. They went out with him. Kharsen Bhentus. Oral Stang. Specialists in financial forecasting exiled by Simon Tregesser.”
“I recall the incident. Not one of Simon’s better days.”
“Bhentus is human. Stang looks like an artifact trying to pass. The M. Shrilica records are inconclusive.”
Lupo glanced at Three and Four. They were researching the names already.
“There are no records on these next three. Lady Midnight. Artifact. Function self-evident. Amber Soul. Artifact with a question mark. Of alien manufacture? Whatever, it gives me the creeps. Turtle. Alien. Actual name unknown. Race probably Ku. Supposedly Shike’s assistant.”
Lupo sensed what was on Two’s mind. “You think it’s a ringer?”
“This one, yes. Maybe more than one.”
“We’re on them. One will meet you on station. Brief him. Stick to Blessed. We’ve got us a situation.”
“The Guardship?”
“Part of it.”
Two said, “We saw a Guardship, too. VII Gemina.” She secured comm.
It was very quiet there till Lupo managed a chuckle. “Seems I was a little optimistic about our success in the end space.”
Nobody said anything. No point going into it till Two arrived with the whole story.
“Let’s bring those last three images back and see what we can get out of the bank.”
The one artifact was in the Banat-Marath catalog, a standard item. The alien was a Ku warrior, possibly useful to Blessed, noteworthy only for its rarity.
That left Amber Soul.
Strange name. Not in the Banat-Marath catalog. Not in any damned file. Human? If so, she was the ugliest woman Lupo ever saw. Alien? Alien artifact? Wouldn’t do any good to run that.
“Lupo.”
“Uhm?”
“Call from Goshe. Just had somebody come at him with the right codes, wants a face to face. Name is Kim Chingamora. I ran him. A class three, reliable, second purser on the Medvihn Traveler Federal Lotus. There hasn’t been a Medvihn in here in eight years. He took an emergency leave and came here on his own credit.”
“He’s got something hot.”
“Something he thinks will set him for life.”
“Clear out. Four, you stay.”
Goshe arrived with the guest, did introductions, faded. Four bustled around offering refreshments. The agent, not on the regular payroll, had yielded enough good material to rate the grade three. He said. “This is my first visit to Tregesser Horata. Impressive.” He was nervous. He had mortgaged his future to get here.
“Relax. If what you have isn’t what you thought, we’ll still cover your expenses and lost salary. You’ve done good work before. You’re the kind of operative we want to keep happy.”
Chingamora laughed nervously. “Better get to it, hadn’t I? If I’ve got fool’s gold, I’ll have to hustle back to my Traveler while they’re holding my berth.”
Lupo nodded.
“All right. I brought a holocasette and a regular video cassette. It’s like this: we picked up a passenger at C. Colignonica who wanted to charter a stopover at N. Etoartsia 3. Nobody thought anything about it. The rich do weird things. And a charter is the only way you can get some places. We were supposed to wait at station for her. She was only going to be down a while.”
He offered the video cassette. It was a one-minute excerpt from local news reporting the death of planetary governor Myth Worgemuth. Authorities wanted to question an unidentified woman with whom he had been seen talking before his fall.
“The holo ties this up?”
“You be the judge.” Chingamora gave Four the other cassette. A shape formed in the projection cube. “Hold this frame. This is the woman we saw publicly, when she left her stateroom. But the day before she was due to leave us, she called the purser’s office for help setting up an itinerary that would get her to N. Compeuia. I popped this while I was going over schedules with her. Next frame.”
It was not a good holo but it was good enough. Lupo said, “You have an excellent memory.”
“I done good?”
Lupo laughed. “You done great. Count on a bonus.”
“That’s a load off.”
“Wait in the outer office while I talk to my technical people.”
Chingamora nodded, stepped out. His nervousness had not abated.
“One of Valerena’s Others,” Four said.
“Yes. Which explains why he’s nervous. He didn’t know she’d taken over till he got here.”
“Going to be some excitement when the news comes.”
“Some, yes.”
“And
Linas Maserang is next.”
“Apparently. And it’s too late to stop it.”
“You think she wanted to be spotted?”
“I don’t know. We’ll find out. Six!” Six came in. “You catch all that?”
“Yes.”
“Assume the Other will head for Tregesser Prime when she’s done with Maserang. Find a choke point and go wait for her. Go back in the other room while I talk to Chingamora again.”
“One thing first. Valerena called. Almost hysterical, she was so excited. She’s off the Guardship. Wants to see you as soon as she gets down.”
“All right.” He opened the door. “Mr. Chingamora. Staff wants to know if you’d be interested in full-time work.” Chingamora looked surprised. “First assignment would be to accompany my assistant to identify and grab the woman who chartered your Traveler. She’s been impersonating Valerena Tregesser. We want to know why.”
Kim Chingamora looked immensely relieved.
— 76 —
There was enough randomly accumulated data in the Starbase pool to pinpoint the source of the meddlesome methane breathers with a sixty percent chance of being right.
XXVIII Fretensis broke off the Web in a magnum launch. Forty minutes later there was no doubt it had come to the right system.
The Outsiders were completely surprised. But they were not unprepared. Moon after moon came to life and joined the contest. Twenty hours after his arrival, WarAvocat consulted his Deified about the advisability of withdrawal.
IV Trajana broke off the Web as the debate raged. It attacked with a ferocity and self-disregard that left WarAvocat XXVIII Fretensis agape.
Eighty-two hours later, the last orbital fortress succumbed. XXVIII Fretensis assumed a polar orbit around the gas giant. IV Trajana moved into equitorial orbit. Both began probing for targets below.
Such sieges lasted for however long they took. The Guardships had the time.
There would be a small difference this time. This gas giant was but one of a hundred dewdrops on the Web.
Canon did not know. The Guardships had not guessed. Simon Tregesser had not known, either. His Outsider allies had not been frank with him.
— 77 —
Turtle watched Tregesser Prime grow. He was impressed. The system was the most vigorous he had seen in a thousand years. Did it matter that its masters represented everything he loathed in the human species?
It mattered. A lot. But temptation was a siren.
He tried concentrating on getting a feel for Lupo Provik, met on station. Blessed had said a lot about Provik.
Provik did not look dangerous. He was a plain man with no sinister aura. But some were that way. They did not wear their character like a Ku.
Provik seemed interested only in Amber Soul. Why her, particularly?
Another shuttle grounded within moments of theirs. As they debarked, Blessed whispered, “That’s my mother. The Chair. What’s she up to?”
Turtle saw four of the woman. And she did wear her character where it could be seen.
“Oh, Turtle!” Midnight enthused. “Look! Have you ever seen anything like that? Isn’t it magnificent?”
Turtle eyed the white fang of the Pylon, rising through the tiers of Tregesser Horata. It was an impressive sight. And it had a sinister feel. Almost an aura of menace. “Yes. It certainly is.”
Valerena felt like hugging Blessed when she saw him. She confined herself to a wave. He returned it uncertainly.
It was a sin they had to eye each other like fighting dogs. Especially now.
Who were all those people with him? One she knew. He was that accountant that had pissed Simon so bad he’d exiled him.
She spied Lupo and his girlfriend, for a moment felt a cold something slide down her spine. But, of course, he would have met Blessed. He had promised to stick to Blessed like a second skin.
Provik left the other party, took charge of her own security. “Lupo, you’ll never believe what I’ve done.”
“I doubt if anything you did would astonish me.”
“This will get you.”
“Save it till we’re inside the Pylon. Four days ago we caught a spy here with a camera and sound gun.”
“What? Working for who?”
“No telling. She destroyed herself. An artifact created for the trade. We get them all the time. Not much you can do but hope what they get isn’t all going the same place.”
“I’ll bust keeping it in, but all right. What about Blessed?”
“He’s going to behave.”
She glared at the Pylon. “Its days are numbered, Lupo.”
Lupo took Valerena to his office rather than hers. He claimed he had things to do that could not wait. She told him he should have gone before he left the shuttle. That earned one of his tired smiles.
He rejoined her changed, refreshed, relaxed, looking like a new man. She supposed he had taken a stimulant.
“Tell me now,” he said.
“House Tregesser has a Guardship. Actually, Valerena Tregesser has her Guardship.”
He just looked at her.
“I’ll change its name. VI Adjutrix. That sounds so... I don’t know. Dull. How about Horido Segada? That sounds dramatic and menacing.”
It meant “Black Storm Rising.” She had heard that somewhere.
“It’s sure to catch the imagination. That’s what the Go called their Main Battle Fleet.”
“So I’ll think of something else. What matters is, I’ve got aGuardship.”
“How?” Cool Lupo. Over his shock already. Probably the biggest shock of his life.
“I seduced it.”
His eyes narrowed.
“And now it will do anything I tell it to keep me liking it. It’ll get a steady diet of Valerena Others.”
“How many of those are there, Valerena? How reliable are they?”
“Why?” She did not like his tone.
“Others can be troublesome if you haven’t kept them on a short leash.”
“There were some things my father kept to himself. I’ll follow his example.”
Lupo shrugged. “We have a Guardship to discuss. I suggest you don’t reserve anything there.”
He was right. He was the Guardship expert. He could tell her if she had made a fool of herself. So she told it all, from first impulse till she set foot on Prime again.
He gave her his absolute attention. He had that knack, of shutting out everything but you. She’d never held anyone’s complete attention so long. He listened gravely, the way, as a child, she had thought a father ought when his little girl brought him tales of her adventures.
“Did I do good?”
“You did marvelous. I may revise my opinion of what kind of Chair you’ll make.”
While the spell held, she asked, “What should I do now?”
“Move it. We’ll have to refit and recrew it. We do that where it sits and every ship through here will run off to tell the universe.”
“It can’t get back onto the Web. That’s why it stayed here. It barely remembers that it was headed for Starbase. If it wasn’t a machine, I’d think it was sick.”
“We’ll head it out past the mines. Maybe to Wodash. I’ll find an orbital path that won’t get any attention. On record we can open a new mining facility to account for the traffic. It can move in starspace, can’t it?”
“Yes.”
“This will be harder than managing that ambush was. We didn’t have to do that under the noses of everybody on a busy strand.”
“I really did something that’s never been done.”
“You made history. If we handle this right, you’ll be the most famous Tregesser ever. But if we screw it up, there won’t be any House Tregesser.”
“Yes.” She was tired, suddenly. “Don’t you get bored, being right all the time? Figure out what you want to do, then set it up.”
“First we need cover stories....”
Valerena left her seat. “Don’t waste time. I want that Guardship f
or my headquarters. You like the Pylon, you can have it. Blessed can have the place on the Gorge. He needs something better than that old relic in the High City.”
Lupo nodded. She thought she detected a hint of strained patience. Every time he talked to her... It hurt. He was worrying about the future of the House again. When he did that, she worried too, wondering if she was incompetent and a peril.
It made her want to scream, “You bastard, I’m trying! I’m doing the best I can! Stop listening to what I say when I’m running my mouth and pay attention to what I’m doing! Help me!”
Provik rose too. “We’ll talk again after you’ve rested. I have a thousand questions about the Guardship.”
“When I get the chance.”
As he opened the door, Lupo added, “I really would like more information about your Others, Valerena. It could be important.”
She went without answering, wondering why the sudden interest.
Lupo stood looking at the door. The family joined him. One said, “I refuse to be amazed by anything ever again.”
Lupo said, “I think it’s time to grow us some brothers and sisters. Otherwise the workload is going to bury us.”
One suggested, “You might consider doubling T. W. a few times, too.” T. W. Trice was the second name on the chart of the House Tregesser security apparat. She was the one person Provik trusted completely. She was the perfect manager, taking most of the routine load off his shoulders.
“I’ve tried. She won’t do it.”
Two observed, “Valerena was sensitive about her Others. She’s worried. Does that mean some of them are out of control?”
“Probably. She had to go churn them out to confuse us, then just turned them loose. We’ll have to find them all, tag them somehow, and keep them under surveillance. The workload keeps growing.”
“And you love it,” Two said. “You’re practically running House Tregesser now.”
“Just this side. They can keep the business end.”