Toby’s mouth was getting increasingly dry, but he pressed on. “You made the original deal with the Families, that ensured their survival in return for their conditional surrender. Are you now saying you regret that?”
“It was the worst mistake I ever made. Never trust the Families. Not while they all bow down to Blue Block. When I allowed the Clans to survive, I betrayed everyone who ever fought for my cause. And I betrayed myself. But I’ve said enough for now. The meeting’s about to start. Why don’t you and Flynn go in and circulate, while I have a quiet word with Ruby? If I make her wait any longer to speak to me, she might well spontaneously combust from sheer frustration.”
Toby smiled politely, nodded to Flynn, and the two of them moved through into the great hall next door, where the assembled crowd was waiting. Toby would have liked very much to eavesdrop on what Random and Ruby were about to say, but if the bounty hunter was about to get violent, Toby didn’t want to be anywhere near her. Hell, he didn’t even want to be in the same building. He threw open the heavy door, and there was a sudden roar of sound, as a hundred conversations rushed over him. It shut off abruptly as Toby shut the door after himself and Flynn, and then it was very quiet in the small room as Random and Ruby stared at each other.
“Don’t do this, Jack,” said Ruby. “I’m telling you; don’t do this.”
“I have to. I can’t let things go on as they are. What’s happened since the rebellion has made a mockery of everything I ever believed in and fought for. If I won’t fight for what I believe in, why should anyone else? What’s about to happen in the hall next door will be a wake-up call for all Humanity.”
“We’re in the middle of a war!”
“We always are, Ruby. That’s what those in power have always used to justify keeping the lower orders in their place. No more.”
“If you go in there and denounce everyone in power, you do it on your own, Jack. I won’t stand with you on this. You’re jeopardizing everything we have! Our position, our wealth, our security ...”
“I thought you’d got tired of being rich ...”
“I’m not that tired, and I never will be! Rich may be boring sometimes, but it beats the hell out of the alternative. I’ve been poor, and I’ll see you and everyone else dead and damned before I go back there again. If you burn your bridges with Parliament and the Families and the undergrounds, and call them all devils and bastards to their faces, who will be left for you to stand with? No one else is going to go along with this. You’ll have to go on the run again, or face being arrested as a danger to the war effort. Is that what you want?”
“Maybe,” said Random. “I’ll run, alone if I have to. I’m a lot harder to catch these days than I used to be, thanks to dear dead Owen. He would have understood what I’m going to do in there. Maybe what I’m about to do is partly in his name, in his memory.” He looked steadily at Ruby. “If I had to run, would you come with me? It would be just like the old days; just us, against the Empire.”
“I hated the old days,” said Ruby flatly. “Nothing could make me go back to them; not you or anybody else. Have you forgotten what life was like, back on Mistworld, before Owen found us? You were a broken old man, working as a janitor in a health spa. And I was working as a bouncer in a series of increasingly seedy bars, living in a single room, with no running water and no heating, eating day-old bread and meat from tins well past their sell-by date. That’s the real reason I joined your rebel cause. I’d have joined any cause that offered me a way out of what my life had become.”
“And because Hazel asked you.”
“Hazel was my friend. She’s dead. And so is Owen. He was our touchstone. He remade us into something finer, held us together and made us believe we were the forces of light. But now he’s gone. I won’t go back to being poor, Jack. Not even for you.”
“You were the one who criticized my deal with the Families. You said that was when you stopped believing in me. Won’t you believe in me now?”
“I don’t see anything to believe in, Jack. This is madness. You’re like a small child, who wants to overturn the gameboard, because he’s losing.”
“I’m just being true to my nature again. I was so busy being Jack Random the politician that I forgot my true self; the professional rebel. It’s my destiny to fight the System. Any System.”
“And what we’ve had together,” said Ruby Journey softly. “That means nothing to you?”
“I could not love thee half so much loved I not honor more. Some truths never change, Ruby.”
“Do what you have to do, Jack. And I’ll do what I have to.”
They smiled slightly at each other, knowing that what was to come was inevitable. That some things could not be turned aside by such small joys as love or happiness. Jack opened the door to the great hall, and Ruby walked in past him, head held high, looking straight ahead. Jack shrugged, and smiled widely at the thought of the terrible thing he was about to do.
The great hall had originally been intended for official receptions, formal dinners and the like. But Random had had all the furniture removed, to make more room for his guests. All that remained was a single raised dais, so that Random’s audience could see him when he spoke. It was a pretty sizable audience. Random leaned against the closed and locked door, looking them over. Stephanie and David Wolfe stood together, perhaps a little more closely than brother and sister should. Stephanie was glaring about her almost triumphantly, as though her invitation to Random’s gathering proved she was still a power to be reckoned with. Daniel seemed somewhat distracted, but then he always did, these days. Probably only came because his sister insisted.
Not too far away stood Evangeline Shreck, representing the clone underground. She smiled graciously about her, quite splendid in a little black dress that emphasized her gamine beauty. Random thought she looked just a little too at ease, for someone who’d only recently been to the funeral of her dead love. At her side was a new figure; the Unknown Clone. He wore full battle armor, sword and gun, and a black leather mask that covered his entire face. Apparently he represented all the clones who’d died in the rebellion, and their refusal to ever be enslaved again. Random wasn’t sure whether this new figure was supposed to be primarily a political statement, or Evangeline’s bodyguard. He was a tall, disturbing presence, and Random couldn’t help feeling there was something familiar about him.
Toby and Flynn were working the crowd, buttonholing the right people, asking awkward questions and refusing to be fobbed off with soundbites.
Two of the esper undergrounds’ enigmatic leaders had turned up, hidden as always behind projected telepathic illusions. One had come as the fabled ogre Hog In Chains; a great beast of a man with a hog’s head, wrapped in yards of rusty chains, carrying a bone club from which human brains dripped constantly. The other figure had come as the Lady Of The Lake; an ethereally slender woman in pure white samite, who ran constantly with the dark river waters that had drowned her. The water collected and pooled about her bare feet, but somehow never spread any farther. Random tried to read some meaning or significance into the esper leaders’ choice of images, but like everyone else he retreated baffled. Sometimes Random thought they just chose their images at random, to mess with people’s heads and keep them off balance.
It was what he would have done.
There were fifty Members of Parliament, from all the main parties and factions, most ostentatiously not talking to one another, but still making pointed comments in loud voices when anyone else made the mistake of looking interested. Almost as many more Family representatives were there too, again covering a broad spectrum of interests and influence, including a last-minute substitution for Cardinal Brendan, who had business elsewhere. The replacement spokesman for Clan Chojiro (and, of course, Blue Block) was Matoul Chojiro; a tall, gawky, and wide-eyed young man, apparently on his first assignment for the Clan. He seemed open and innocent, and fooled absolutely no one. And last, but definitely not in any way least, the large and port
ly figure of Elias Gutman, Speaker of the House. He smiled amiably at one and all, but his eyes were cold and thoughtful.
Jack Random strode through the crowd, brushing aside those before him by sheer force of personality, and came to a halt before Gutman. The Speaker bowed, with surprising grace for someone of his bulk. Random didn’t bow in return. “I’m glad you’re here, Elias. What I’ve got planned just wouldn’t be the same without you here.”
“How could I not attend?” said Gutman easily. “After your excesses on Loki, I’m as interested as anyone in how you plan to justify yourself. And then there’s your promise of a statement of policy that will change Imperial politics forever. I do hope that wasn’t just rhetoric, Random. I’d hate to think I was brought here under false pretenses, when there are so many other useful things I could be doing.”
“Don’t worry, Elias,” said Random. “I guarantee this is one statement of principles you’ll never forget.”
He strode on through the last of the crowd, and jumped lightly up onto the raised dais at the end of the hall. Ruby stepped up to stand beside him, still scowling. The great crowd before them quickly grew quiet, conversations abandoned in midstream, as they realized Random was about to start.
“Thank you all for coming,” said Jack Random calmly. “So good to see so many of you here. Not a bad turnout, all things considered. I had hoped a few more of the top echelons might have put in an appearance ... but you’ll do nicely to help me make my point. Let me start by addressing my recent visit to the planet Loki. I’m sure you’ve all heard awful rumors about what I did there. I’d just like to say that they’re all true. Especially the worst ones.” The listening crowd stirred and murmured uneasily, but Random just kept talking over them, and they shut up to hear what he was saying. He was smiling as he looked about him, and sounded quite calm, almost cheerful. “When I arrived on Loki, I found an unacceptable situation. War criminals from the old Imperial administration had been placed in power over the colonists, and were bleeding the economy dry, to feather the nests of their backers, here on Golgotha. So I had them all hanged. The rebel leaders there had sold out to Shub, so I had them hanged too.
“They were all guilty. All dirty. All politicians.
“I learned many valuable, if painful, lessons on Loki. You see, I have drifted very far from what I used to be, and what I used to stand for. I was the professional rebel, and I stood for justice. To win the rebellion, I allowed myself to be persuaded away from such an absolute position, and embraced the compromises and little victories of politics. Just to save a few lives. But after Lionstone fell, I saw my dream of freedom and honor for all corrupted by the very people I entrusted it to. Nothing’s really changed. The same sort of people are still in charge, and many of the old injustices are still in place. And I will not stand for that any longer.
“There will be no more compromises. No more betrayals. No more politics from me. No more secret meetings in back rooms, where the privileged few decide the fate of the many. I return to my old mantle of the professional rebel, answerable to no one but myself and my own conscience. I am back, and I will not be turned aside again.”
There was a pause as he looked out over his gathered guests, still smiling that unsettling endless smile.
“And what, exactly,” said Elias Gutman from the middle of the crowd, “does this change in direction amount to? What are you going to do, Random? What can you do?”
“Just what I did on Loki,” said Jack Random easily. “Punish the guilty. Kill all of those responsible for the corruption of my dream. Kill all the lying politicians, the special interest groups who only care for their own, the Families striving to claw their way back into power and privilege. I’m going to kill everyone who denies the people the freedom I promised them. Starting with everyone in this room. I could have just planted a bomb here, but I wanted this to be a personal statement, so I’m going to kill you all personally. Feel free to pray to any God you think might be listening.”
He turned suddenly, without warning, and struck Ruby Journey a blow to the head that would have killed anyone else. She dropped limply to the dais and lay still, barely breathing. Random looked down at her, his face calm and unmoved.
“Sorry, Ruby. But I couldn’t have you interfering.”
“Jesus Christ,” whispered Toby. “I think he means it. Are you getting this, Flynn?”
“We are now going out live, Boss. Why don’t you look for an exit, in case we need one in a hurry?”
“There are only two doors, and I’ve sealed both of them,” said Random, raising his voice to be heard over the growing babble of his audience, as those nearest the exits struggled with the doors and couldn’t budge them. “No one’s going anywhere. Time to die, people.”
His sword was suddenly in his hand as he leapt lightly down from the dais, and cut down the representative from Clan Chojiro, even as that young man was drawing a concealed disrupter. The heavy steel blade slammed down, cutting through flesh and bone to bury itself in the man’s heart. He shuddered, but didn’t fall. Random jerked the sword out again, and blood sprayed high into the air as the Chojiro finally collapsed. The people nearest him began screaming, and tried to back away, but the crush of the crowd kept most of them from going anywhere. Random lashed out again, and his sword sheared clean through an MP’s skull. The politician sank to his knees, his jerking hands rising as though to clasp the half of his head that remained.
People were hammering on the locked doors now, but the heavy oak resisted them easily. Very few had brought weapons. They hadn’t thought they’d be needed at a political meeting inside the Parliament building itself. People screamed for security guards to come and save them, but Random had sent them away on urgent missions earlier. Some would come, eventually, but by then it would all be over.
Men and women died screaming as Random cut and hacked his way through the crowd, like a wolf in a flock of sheep. He was still smiling, but now he was showing his teeth, and his eyes were very bright. The few with swords and guns were pushed forward to meet him, but they didn’t even slow Random down. He was inhumanly fast and strong, and the only one who might have stood against him still lay unconscious on the dais. Blood flew on the air as Random cut through the panicked crowd like a reaper with a scythe, leaving a trail of the dead and dying behind him. He came upon Toby Shreck and Flynn, and paused for a moment. Toby felt a cold hand clutch at his heart. And then Random nodded calmly to him.
“Stay honest, newsman. And be sure Flynn gets my good side.”
And he moved on, to kill more people.
Random bore down on Daniel Wolfe, and the young man yelled for his sister to get behind him. He had a sword in his hand. A Wolfe never went anywhere unarmed. Behind him, Stephanie yelled, “Kill him! Kill him, Danny!” in a voice only just short of hysteria. Daniel blocked Random’s first blow, and even the second, but then the Maze man’s superior strength smashed Daniel’s sword right out of his hand. Daniel tried to jump Random, his hands reaching for Random’s throat, and Random’s sword came up out of nowhere and plunged through Daniel’s gut and out his back. Daniel squeezed his eyes shut, but didn’t cry out. Random jerked his sword free, and turned on Stephanie, but Daniel’s arm swept out to pull her behind him again. Random plunged his sword into Daniel’s body over and over again, but though Daniel bled and shuddered with every blow, he wouldn’t cry out and he wouldn’t fall and leave Stephanie unprotected. He backed slowly away, keeping her behind him, while Random hacked away at him like a woodsman with a stubborn tree. Finally Random thrust his sword all the way through Daniel’s body. The crosspiece of the hilt buried itself in Daniel’s stomach as the long blade burst out of his back and went on to transfix Stephanie too. Her scream was suddenly stopped by a mouthful of blood. Random pulled back his blade, and she fell backward. Daniel cried out at last, and turned to cradle his dead sister’s body in his blood-soaked arms. Random shrugged, and moved on.
Clones and espers and politicians and aristos fell
before him, till he had to step over piled-up bodies to get at the living. The biggest piles were before the two locked doors. Someone was pounding and shouting on the other side now, but they couldn’t help. Random was soaked in blood now, none of it his own. He was still breathing easily and his swordarm was as strong as ever. He felt as though he could do this forever, and never grow tired.
He finally stopped and looked around him, searching for someone of note to kill next. The two esper leaders, Hog In Chains and the Lady Of The Lake, had blinked out of existence the moment the killing began, but he’d always suspected they were only illusions anyway. It didn’t matter. He’d find and kill them later. That just left the clone leader, Evangeline Shreck, guarded by the Unknown Clone. The masked man stood before Evangeline, holding his sword steadily. Random walked unhurriedly over to him, and smiled at him. It took more than a mask to hide a man from a Maze-trained mind.
“I’m glad you didn’t die after all, son. I always wondered how I’d do against you.”
“You’ve gone mad,” said Finlay steadily. “This is insane.”
“You’re a fine one to talk,” said Random. “How many aristos and politicians died at your hands during the rebellion? You were the undergrounds’ pet assassin. All they had to do was point you in the right direction and turn you loose. Don’t tell me you didn’t enjoy your war.”