Bruen shifted his eyes to Hyde, chin propped on a creased palm. "Indeed. Wel, we expected this. So far so good. Fear feeds discontent, the desire to return to a state of normalcy."
Butla formed his fingers into a fist, watching the muscles ripple in his forearm. "So far, the Regans have acted predictably, Magister," his deep bass rumbled, "and pray to God they continue to."
"You still agree that we should let them have free reign for a while?" Hyde asked.
Butla lifted a slab of shoulder. "I can't see us making any headway while they maintain such vigilance. This new Division First of theirs, um, Atkin is his name, he's scared, worried about his career should the Regans suffer another disaster."
Bruen nodded. "And his worry in turn worries you?"
Butla Ret's dark eyes flashed, "You tell me such behavior isn't dangerous, then I just might believe it."
Bruen sniffed and eased his aching hip. "Of course not, Butla. The man is paranoid; as his unreasonable fear increases, so does the probability that he will react unpredictably. It's a vicious cycle this type of revolution engenders."
Ret stretched his thick legs, arms crossed. "And what would you suggest, Magister?"
"How tight is the security in the Regan military compounds?" Bruen leaned back, closing his eyes, tracing the possibilities. How would the Regans react?
What countermoves would they make within the limited perceptual framework of the future they insisted on maintaining? His mind delighted itself with the permutations. In the range of potential responses, none seemed to play against them. But which future observation would become phase reality
"They allow no Targans past the checkpoints."
"But you could get inside?"
Butla's expression barely changed; however, his voice chided, "Master! These are Regans! They haven't the slightest hint of what the word 'security' means, let alone how to enforce it."
Bruen looked at Hyde. Can I take this gamble? From intelligence sources, Tybalt would most likely install a sycophant in Atkin's place. Even if a capable man were hired to replace him, it would take time to reorganize. In the meantime, we can operate to increase Regan imbalance. We must hold out until Staffa can be brought within our reach. If we can't, all is lost!
"Then you could remove Division First Atkin?" Bruen asked through the constriction in his throat.
Butla's lips parted to reveal straight white teeth. "I have been waiting, Magister. Killing occasional Regan soldiers in the dark has proved sport but not challenge." Butla straightened, excitement in his eyes. "Further, we can maximize on this. I could decapitate the First Division in one night's work.
At the same time, if the opportunity presents itself, I might be able to make a substantial contribution to our intelligence net regarding Then strategy and tactics."
"Do so!" Hyde managed, cackling gleefully. His sharp response triggered a coughing fit. The old man's face contorted as he bent double, fighting for air.
Bruen placed a friendly hand on the Magister's shoulder. "Old friend, I fear for you. This affliction continues to worsen."
Hyde waved it off, groping his way to his feet. Still hacking, hand over mouth, he shuffled out of the room, a pathetic broken figure.
Butla sat hunched, head down, hands knotted in his lap.
"I don't know how long he'll last," Bruen admitted with a sigh. "There comes a point beyond which not even the best of medicine can help. Magister Hyde has reached that. The quanta, you understand. Nothing lasts forever—not even a great and kind man."
Ret's voice gentled. "He was my instructor when I first came here as a novice Initiate. He ... taught me of love and God and future when all I had was hatred, anger, and confusion in my soul."
Bruen smiled. "Then he also taught you that observation creates a phase reality through entropy. Phase reality imparts experience of the Now.
Experience is knowledge and that, in turn, is stored in energy—which is indestructible. Death, dear Butla, is nothing more than a redistribution of energy which "... in the end is brought to God through entropy when the universe colapses," Butla Ret finished. His smile was warm, relieved. "Yes, Magister, he taught me those things. I fear not for his immortal soul. I regret the loss of his company and goodness. I will experience pain and hollowness at his passing."
"We create our own suffering, Butla."
"Free will, the element of choice, Magister," the assassin pointed out, lifting a huge hand in a motion of futility. "The result of a self-redefinition—the search to establish normality—in a phase reality of constantly changing observation in the eternal Now." He shook his head. "What damage we do to ourselves and others."
"Learning never comes cheaply, Butla." Bruen pulled at his ear. He hesitated before asking, "And Arta?" He watched Ret's thoughts shift from introspection to satisfaction.
"She's doing most remarkably, Magister." Ret grinned to himself, enjoying some vision in his mind. "You should have seen the first time I put her in a dark hallway full of debris. You know, boards, broken glass, stacked tin cans, bits of string hanging from the ceiling." Reg's grin spread. "I turned off the lights and she threw a fit. Practically killed herself in the first meter."
"But she's improved."
Ret steepled his fingers. "A great deal of pleasure comes to a teacher who guides a student he knows will one day surpass him in his mastery. She is such a one. She will be very, very good, Magister."
"And in the doja?" Bruen asked softly, imagining Arta, naked on the thick pads, a stun knife in her hand as she attempted to penetrate the total darkness. She would be standing, legs bent and braced, lithe, her pose alert for the slightest sound, the least movement of the air against her skin or hair.
Extending her senses to feel for her antagonist.
Ret laughed. "I have never had a pupil who learned or modified the situation as readily as she, Magister. True, I shocked her time and time again with the electric prod, but she has constantly improved, changing tactics from lying still near a wall to switching back to the changing room—even hanging from the walls above my reach."
A deep reverberating laugh exploded from Butla. "She's at the stage now where she hates me with a vengeance because I make it seem so easy while she is blind to her own improvement." He paused, sharp black eyes on Bruen. "I am taking her with me when I kill Atkin."
So, another test, dearest Arta. At the same time, look at the concern in Butla's eyes. Dearest Gods, no! He can't come to love her! Impossible. I must handle this most carefully.
"You are fond of her," Bruen remarked casually as he tried to calm the first creepers of disturbance weaving through his brain.
Butla Ret tilted his head back, broad jaw working from side to side. "Yes, Magister. I am."
Bruen shifted, irritated at the pain in his hip. "You know about the trigger?
I don't have to remind you what woud happen if—"
"I understand." Ret nodded slowly, sadly. "Yes, Magister. I'm not a fool. I know what I deal with."
Yes, I suppose you do. And if you only knew who she is—who she is intended for—could you still keep your hands off her, Butla, my old friend?
Bruen grunted a sour chuckle. "She was made for love. That inherent quality has condemned her from the moment of her birth." He frowned, a hollowness in his guts. "What sort of existence do we have, Buta, when an ability to love is damnation?"
"The purpose of God—"
"Yes, yes, I know!" Bruen snapped in irritation. Why does Arta always leave me off balance? "I don't always have to like the way things are, do I?"
Ret's gaze dropped. "No, Magister. We, the Seddi, have already taken a hand in attempting to change that phase reality. You, Magister, made that decision so long ago. You can see what we've done. Today, at least, humanity has a chance."
Bruen barked an acid laugh,irritated at himself for foolish sentimentality, irritated with Butla because he naively hoped—and that sullied his own cynicism.
"We've increased suffering in this little corn
er of Free Space, Butla." He resettled himself in the gravchair, moving his pained hip to a different position. "And what else? Rega and Sassa are balanced precariously on the edge of oblivion. The Star Butcher waits, licking his lips for the scraps. That machine down there in the rock is a malignant cancer sending dendrites throughout human society. It's—"
"We have it fooled," Butla reminded.
"Do we?" Bruen's hands spread. "Yes, we ... I lie to it constantly, feeding it a bit of misinformation here and another there, but what do we know about its purpose? What is it? Who built it? I don't think its origins were human.
There's something alien and incomprehensible about the Mag Comm. Oh, sure, we've seen some of the banks—all technologically impossible to us. Consider.
In another day and age, Butla, we would call that . . . thing a God!" He paused. "And we're enslaved by its powers. Without it, Makarta would die.
Without its coputational powers, we can't run our statistics, or access our historical files—or even keep track of our field agents. We need it to do our work."
Bruen laughed at Ret's suddenly cowed expression. "You see, my friend, you begin to understand the dilemma of having that 'power' constantly under our feet. To those of us who know it—deal with it—the question hovers forever in the backs of our minds. Do we manipulate it? Or do we each manipulate each other? Or—and most frightening— does it only allow us to think we manipulate it?"
His thoughts drifted. "There are no parameters of accurate measurement. Why does it order the things it does? At times, I get an eerie feeling that we've become toys, pieces to move about the table for its own amusement—but to what purpose?"
Bruen jerked himself straight, aware of the fear that had come to possess his voice. Doddering old fool, you're too old, too tired to keep control of your own systems! I must get more sleep. Too much is at stake these days.
Ret stared at him, somber-eyed. "Magister, you live a nightmare. What if you fail to veil your mind one of these days? That reality dangles out there beyond the quantum wave functions, bouncing that potential reality back in so many possibilities. How . . . how do you deal with the knowledge that you might be betraying all of humanity?"
Bruen placed bone-thin fingers to his temples, pressing slightly and rotating his hands. "I just do." He raised a hand in protest. "No, my friend, I know that is no answer. The only other thing I can tell you is that I have faith.
What? Heresy from a Seddi Magister? Perhaps. I think, however, that you of all people can understand."
"Why me, Magister?"
Bruen's smile was a wispy thing. "You, Magister Assassin, carry the burden of death constantly within your fingertips. What if your poison reaches the wrong person, kills the innocent? What if the man we remove was just about to betray his cause? God built the universe on uncertainty. The quanta are God's joke on reality; they affect everything. You share my burden—the power of life and death based on future probabilities of human action."
"The chance for error." Ret rumbled in a deep bass. "But Magister, for me, I must judge the value of each life one by one. You, most venerable teacher, must judge the future of all humanity."
"I throw a Seddi paradox back at you, Butla Ret. If the God mind is one, and if the God mind is infinitely divisible into awareness, which reality phase do you judge, and which do I? According to the quanta, it's all the same—and all different."
"You are very good, Magister, you have shifted attention away from my question. Soon you will have us steered into the solipsistic perspective of existence. I repeat, however, how do you bear responsibility for the probability of your own failure?" Ret cocked his head, black eyes gleaming as he laced his fingers together.
Bruen sniffed wearily and sighed. "I do so because no one else can. Does that surprise you?" He smiled, seeing disbelief in Butla's eyes. "It does? Very well, are you ready to sit down before the machine and attempt to deflect it while it's within your mind, sharing your thoughts?"
"No, Magister." A shudder shook Ret's massive shoulders.
Bruen nodded. "You see, Butla. tike Arta, I, too, was condemned from birth. My parallels are very like hers. No one else can fill her role. She is unique in that, just as I myself am unique in dealing with the Mag Comm. Our lives consist of nothing more than individual phase realities which happened to fit a probabilistic niche some thing happened to observe. That's a frightening thought—be it true or not."
Butla Ret's lips twitched. "And God has built uncertainty into the very underpinnings of the universe."
"Now you see the true nightmare of existence, my friend."
Staffa kar Therma lay on cold stone, unaware of the world around him and the mildly curious stares of his companions. Instead, he fought the dream that wound through his aching head . . . and succumbed to defeat.
He twisted and ran, bolts of energy seeking his vulnerable body. The corridor down which his bare feet pelted had been bent by explosions that had wrenched blasted steel into jagged edges. Here and there an overhead panel provided just enough light to show him the way through eerie shadows.
Behind him, the faceless pursuers howled, shrieked, and cursed as they shot at his fleeing back.
Fiery air ripped in and out of Staffa's searing lungs. Ahead of him, a bulkhead exploded in fire and destruction. The concussion smashed him onto his back, impaling his shivering flesh on one of the torn petal edges of metal that thrust up from the floor.
Staffa's throat tore in violent screams as he felt the cold metal slipping through his back and slicing neatly through peritoneum and spinal column. At first his intestines slid away from the edge, squirming to avoid the invasion that finally severed them, spilling hot brown digestive juices into his body to bu and begin eating away at the very flesh they served.
Staffa whimpered as he looked down, seeing the bulge beneath hard belly muscles, feeling steel cutting inside, poking the white skin of his stomach up in a steeple while the widening edge filled him, foreign, hard, cold.
In slow motion, the point formed under his stretching skin, lifting his naval, turning it inside out.
His choking lungs exploded again as the keen gray point broke through the strained skin that slipped rubberlike and clinging along the lifting edge. It stopped, protruding—a gleaming peak of death over the snowy-white of his skin.
His brain terror-locked. He choked on fear and disbelief. A wretched sob shook his lungs while cold from the steel slowly spread through his gut, seeking his vitality, drawing i his life into the impersonal metal.
He became aware of the shuffling of millions of feet. Unable to tear his straining eyes from the spear of geaming gray lancing from his tortured gut, he heard the mutter of their voices, thick with hatred: watching . . . watching him die.
He screamed again, refusing to look up, refusing to see the damnation in their haunted dead eyes.
A slow murmur stirred them. "You are one of us now, Star Butcher! One of us!"
It rustled in his mind, chilling, cursing.
They shuffled aside and Chrysla stepped out to stare at him with haunted yelow eyes. With one slim white hand, i she reached down and pressed a firing stud to blast him. :
"NO!" Staffa screamed, knowing it was all a dream—one from which he could not force himself to awaken. A dream he must live forever.
CHAPTER 10
Tybalt the Imperial Seventh reclined in his plush gravity chair, surrounded by his opulent sandwood desk. The airconditioning stirred the jasmine-scented air above his head and the Regan sun shimmered down through the crystal skylight.
Gentle strains of an obscure Maikan symphony soothed him. He absently began to chew his thumb as he watched the message fax. The holo of Ily Takka paused after her ritual greeting. Tybalt smiled.
How I've missed you, my hot fox. Haven't had a decent romp since you left.
Enjoying the taste of power, my precious? Beware, it's poisonous. He laughed.
Also true to her prediction, he had grown tired of having no one to talk to
.
The others simply agreed or refused to express their true feelings on matters out of fear of his power.
How lonely, this business of being Emperor.
Her next words brought him upright. "My Lord Emperor, it seems we have miscalculated. We thought Staffa might bargain beyond our means. We accepted that we might have to eliminate him from the service of the Sassans. To my surprise and astonishment he has turned down both the Sassan offer of contract—and ours. Lord Emperor, he wasn't even present. We had to deal face-to-face with his Wing Commander—and in the presence of the Sassan Legate to boot. The exact transcript of my actions and offers is enclosed with this report. Suffice it to say, the Companions don't care to listen to offers at this time, nor will the Lord Commander fight for either side. Enclosed is the packet his people prepared. I trust you will find it to be most interesting."
Impossible! Staffa turned down the largest contract ever offered? He wouldn't even listen to an offer from Rega? Or Sassa? A sudden shiver ran down Tybalt's spine. What did it mean? What was Staffa's angle? Was he preparing to go rogue? Perhaps turn to piracy? Or worse, could it be some deep conspiracy he and the Sassans had concocted during Staffa's last contract?
Tybalt picked up the brief from the ceramic table before him. He frowned at the broken seal and looked back at the screen as Ily continued, "Not the least of the revelations to come out of the Itreatic Asteroids is that Staffa himself is on leave. He has disappeared." Her lips curled with triumph. "But, Lord Emperor, he is vacationing within Rega and I believe I have the ability to find him. I will keep you informed concerning the results of my search."
Tybalt realized dumbly that his mouth gaped open. The Lord Commander had gone totally daft! The single most important man in the politics of Free Space—disappeared! Vacationing, by the Bloody Gods!