Rath's Reckoning

By Piers Platt

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1

The automatic doors slid open, and Beauceron stepped into the parking lot of the spaceport rental center, squinting to protect his eyes from the swirling dust. He had never really considered Alberon a particularly humid planet, but New Liberia’s arid climate made him realize just how comfortable his home was. He found Rozhkov standing by their suitcases, and showed him the keys to their rental air car.

“Good,” Rozhkov told him, shutting down his holophone. “They’ll be here in ten minutes.”

“They have what we need?”

Rozhkov nodded. They found the air car parked three rows away – Rozhkov loaded the suitcases in the trunk while Beauceron took the pilot’s seat. Beauceron noticed the car’s hoverjet intakes were rusting, but when he ran the programmed pre-flight sequence, the vehicle started up readily. He turned on his datascroll and opened up the location tracking app, searching for the ankle cuff he had forced Rath to wear.

Let’s hope he still has it on, that rogue.

Beauceron had checked the app before they left Alberon – it had tracked Rath’s progress from Beauceron’s apartment to the spaceport, and then lost signal when Rath’s flight to New Liberia accelerated into faster-than-light travel.

But he probably took it off while he was on that flight.

Suddenly, a series of dots appeared on the map of New Liberia on the screen.

He forgot about it! No, surely not. He left it on intentionally, in case something went wrong. Good man.

According to the digital map, Rath had traveled south toward the penal colony, spent nearly a day in and around the closest settlement to the colony, and then made a detour out into a rural area for several hours. After that, his path went directly to the penal facility – and through it, Beauceron saw.

He left the complex almost immediately, and headed into the fallout zone.

Beauceron tapped on the Refresh button.

“Martin,” Rozhkov called from the rear of the car.

Beauceron stepped out of the car, and saw two men approaching. Rozhkov held a hand up in greeting as Beauceron joined him.

The two men stopped several feet away. “First time in the Territories?” one of them asked.

“Yes,” Rozhkov said. “It’s quite scenic here. We rarely get a chance to visit planets outside of Federacy space.”

Hearing the correct code phrase, the man relaxed and stepped forward, setting a small carrying case in the open trunk of the car. “Here you go, sir. Take a look and make sure it’s everything you need, and then I’ll need you to sign for those.”

“Of course,” Rozhkov told him. “Thanks for the assistance.”

“Not a problem,” the man said. “It’s not often we see colleagues out here in the Territories … nice to see a familiar face, as it were.”

Rozhkov clicked the case open and lifted an auto-pistol out of the molded lining. He checked the action, then repeated the process with a second pistol. “Excellent.”

Beauceron peered around the parking lot, checking to ensure that no one was observing them.

“You boys need help with whatever you’re getting into?” the other man asked, indicating the guns.

Beauceron shook his head. “Not right now, thank you. But we’ll let you know.”

Rozhkov finished signing a datascroll and passed it back to the men, then smiled. “Thank you, gentlemen.”

“Any time. Stay safe.” The undercover agents shook hands with them, then headed back to their own car.

Rozhkov held out one of the pistols, and Beauceron took it reluctantly.

“Would you prefer we bought some on the black market, Martin?” Rozhkov asked.

“No,” Beauceron sighed. “I just don’t like lying to other police officers, that’s all.”

“Come on,” Rozhkov grunted. “Time’s short.”

In the pilot’s seat, Beauceron set a course for the penal colony, and then picked up his datascroll again.

“He left the ankle cuff on,” he told Rozhkov.

“He did? Well, that’s a welcome surprise.” Rozhkov took a sip from a water bottle. “So where is he?”

Beauceron studied the map. “He entered the penal colony yesterday, and then moved into the fallout zone inside the city.”

Rozhkov leaned across, peering to see the screen.

“It looks like he went fairly deep into the city, then made his way straight back out overnight … it’s possible he found her – the one he’s looking for, the other assassin.”

“Don’t tell me they’re already catching a flight off-planet,” Rozhkov grumbled.

“No. His track from this morning follows this road away from the penal colony, and then deviates off-road, heading east for several miles. It ends here – that’s where he is now, the tracker is still live.” Beauceron tapped on the screen, and a satellite image overlaid the map.

“What’s there?” Rozhkov asked.

“Nothing.” Beauceron frowned. “Grassland. Open plain.”

“Well, let’s go find out what he’s up to.”

They landed on the grassy plain nearly two hours later. Beauceron climbed out of the air car, jogged a short ways, and then bent over. Rozhkov got out of the car and leaned his elbows on the roof, watching. “Well?” he asked.

Beauceron straightened, holding a bracelet aloft in one hand. “It’s his tracking cuff.”

“Shit,” Rozhkov observed. “He dumped it, then. Back to the spaceport? Try to spot them before they get off-planet?”

Beauceron shook his head slowly. “There are no tracks.”

“So?” Rozhkov asked. “They were in an air car, he took it off, and tossed it out the window.”

Beauceron traced a circle in the dirt. “There’s an impact crater here – it fell out of an air car, you’re right. But why would he leave it on so long, and then take it off at that exact moment?”

“Maybe he finally remembered it. Or she made him take it off.”

Beauceron scowled and walked back to the air car, taking out his datascroll. He set the small screen on the hood of the car, showing it to Rozhkov. “Look, they followed this road for several miles after they escaped from the colony. Then they went airborne at this point. Why do that if they were in an air car? Why not just take off right away?”

“You think they met someone in an air car?”

Beauceron met Rozhkov’s gaze. “I think someone met them. The Janus Group.”

Rozhkov glanced over his shoulder, scanning the grassy horizon. “That would be bad.”

“Very bad,” Beauceron agreed. He tapped on the screen, zooming out. With his finger, he followed the last line that Rath’s tracker had drawn on the screen, extending it out in the same direction. “If they changed direction after dropping the cuff, we won’t have much chance of finding them,” he observed. Then his finger stopped, and he zoomed in on the satellite image again, bending closer to the screen.

“What?” Rozhkov asked.

“There’s an abandoned cattle ranch along their route, about eight miles from here.” He looked up at Rozhkov. “A nice, isolated location to conduct some business in private.”

Rozhkov grinned. “When this is over, I am going to lock the police commissioner in my office until he agrees to give you your job back, Martin.”

Beauceron laughed. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. We don’t even know for sure that they’re at the ranch. And if they are, they’re going to see us coming. We can’t exactly just walk up and knock on the door.”

Rozhkov loosened the pistol in his belt holster. “Do you have any other ideas?”

* * *

Beauceron traded a look with Rozhkov, and then knocked firmly on the ranch house door. As he stood waiting on the house’s porch, he cast a wary eye at the armored air van parked at the side of the house.

“This is crazy, Alexei,” he muttered.

“There’s just that one van. There can’t be too many of them,” Rozhkov whispered back.

The door opened, startling Beauceron. A man in tactical gear stood in the frame, examining them warily over the barrel of his auto-rifle. To his left, Beauceron saw movement at one of the ground floor windows, and to his right, another guard stepped into view at the end of the porch, covering them with his own rifle.

“Yes?” the man in the doorway asked.

Beauceron cleared his throat, but Rozhkov spoke first. “I’m Colonel Rozhkov, Interstellar Police – Alberon Division.” He held up his badge.

The man raised an eyebrow. “You’re a long way from home, Colonel.”

“Yes, we are. And way out of our jurisdiction.” Rozhkov smiled. “But you and I actually share a different employer.” Rozhkov held up the holophone the Janus Group had given him years ago, and flicked open the encryption passcode app. The guard glanced at it, and Beauceron saw a flicker of recognition.

“I need to speak with your prisoner immediately,” Rozhkov continued. “I believe he knows the identity of an employee within Janus Group Headquarters that has been feeding information to an organized crime task force in my division.”

The man frowned. “We weren’t told to expect you. My last directive—”

“Look,” Rozhkov interrupted. “I just made a long trip, and while we argue about protocol, that informant back on my planet is compiling another report. I would rather my name stay off that report.”

“If we’re not supposed to be here,” Beauceron pointed out, “how did we know to find you here?”

The man looked over at Beauceron, considering. Beauceron felt a bead of sweat form at his brow. Finally, the man’s finger moved off his trigger. “Wait here while we clear it.”

“Here, use this,” Rozhkov told him, tossing his holophone at the guard. The man juggled his rifle, holding up a hand to catch the inbound holophone. But Rozhkov was already turning in place, drawing his pistol and opening fire on the guard at the end of the porch. Beauceron, caught unawares, dropped to one knee instinctively, scrabbling for his own sidearm. He heard a burst of automatic fire from his left – the guard at the window, he realized – but the guard at the door was already recovering, the barrel of his rifle swinging up. Beauceron fired twice, and the man went down, the rifle discharging uselessly into the floor. Beauceron jumped up and swung through the door, turning left, pistol at the ready. The guard at the window was dead – shot by Alexei, Beauceron saw. He turned.

Alexei slumped to his knees, grimacing. His white dress shirt was stained in three different places, a neat row from belly to armpit.

“Oh, god,” Rozhkov said.

“Alexei!” Beauceron rushed over to him.

“That was foolish of me.”

“Yes, it was,” Beauceron said. He helped the older man sit back, and then slid him over to the house’s outer wall, propping him against the door frame. Beauceron took a closer look at the wounds. “Alexei, this is bad.”

Rozhkov let his head rest against the house. “Leave me. There will be other guards. They’ll have heard the shots.”

“We can call for an ambulance,” Beauceron argued.

“Go, Martin!”

Beauceron grabbed the dead guard’s rifle and stood up, hesitating.

Rozhkov met his eyes. “I’m sorry, Martin. For everything.”

“You did it for Katarina,” Beauceron said. He shrugged. “You had to.”

“You’ll see this through, won’t you?” Rozhkov asked.

Beauceron nodded, tears welling in his eyes. “I promise.”

“Good. Be careful.”

Beauceron gave him a tight smile, and then disappeared into the house. Rozhkov let his head rest against the door frame, and looked out across the porch and the flat grassland beyond. As he watched, a gust of wind twisted and flattened the brown grasses, creating swirls and eddies in the waving stalks.

“Of course he’ll see it through,” he told himself. “Martin always sees it through.”

Rozhkov smiled and closed his eyes.

* * *

Paisen’s breathing was becoming ragged. Strapped to the table across from her, Rath felt his heart racing in fear, and took a deep breath, attempting to calm himself. On the screen above him, he saw the two men step back from Paisen, and lift the electrodes from her chest. Her body stopped convulsing, but her chest heaved as she tried to catch her breath. She was still bleeding from the deep cuts along her arms, Rath saw.

“Okay, 339,” one of the men said, checking his watch. “That was one hour. Eleven to go, and then you get a break for the night. We’re going to move on to the acid next.”

Rath saw Paisen spit to one side.

“Fuck you,” she told the man.

Rath watched as the man pushed a finger slowly into one of the cuts on Paisen’s left arm, twisting it cruelly as he dug into the wound. Paisen screamed.

“Scream all you want,” the man told her. “With the noise cancelers on, no one can hear you.”

“I can hear her,” a familiar voice said, from across the room. The two men’s heads snapped up, and Rath saw them freeze. “But with those noise cancelers on, you didn’t hear me come in, did you?”

Rath strained to look at this new person, but they were out of his field of view. Then he recognized the voice.

“Martin!”

“Hello, Rath.” Beauceron flicked the barrel of his rifle toward the two men. “Undo her, please.”

One of the men shook his head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Do it now,” Beauceron said, quietly.

On the viewscreen above him, Rath saw one of the men move to the side of the table, and begin unbuckling Paisen’s restraints. She watched impassively, waiting until all of the restraints were off to sit up on the table. A shiver of cold ran across her body, and then she took a deep breath.

“Okay, now—” Beauceron started, but Paisen was already slipping off the table, grabbing a scalpel from the trolley of instruments.

“No!” Beauceron yelled, but Rath saw her strike once, twice, and abruptly both men were on the floor, screaming in pain. Paisen rolled across the table, dropping to the floor on the far side, putting the table between herself and Beauceron.

“You killed them!” Beauceron blurted.

“He did warn you that letting me out was a bad idea,” Paisen called out, her voice hoarse.

“They deserved a trial,” Beauceron protested.

“They got exactly what they deserved. Now, I don’t want to sound ungrateful,” she said, “but you need to drop that rifle if you want to live.”

“It’s okay,” Rath said. “Martin’s a friend.”

“Friend or not, I’m not in a real trusting mood right now,” Paisen told him. “And that includes you, Rath.”

“Martin, just put it down,” Rath said.

Beauceron frowned, but put the rifle on the floor.

“Slide it over this way,” Paisen ordered. When the weapon came to a stop, she stood and retrieved it, watching Beauceron carefully. She walked over to Rath, and looked down at him.

“Are you okay?” Rath asked, looking up at her.

“I’ve been better.”

“Can you cut me loose?” he asked.

She tilted her head to the side. “I’m not sure I want to. You’re a serious liability.”

“Paisen, I’m sorry. I didn’t know they were following me. I just wanted to get you out of harm’s way.”

She glowered at him. “You just worry about yourself.” Then she sighed. “If I let you out, from here on, I do the planning, I do the thinking. Got it?”

“Got it.”

Free from the restraints, Rath sat up, rubbing his wrists where the bindings had been. “Martin.” He looked over at the detective. “I am really glad to see you. And I’m sorry about the stun dart … and all of that. You found the ankle cuff?”

“Yes,” Beauceron said. “They shot Rozhkov, he’s outside.”

“Okay,” Rath told him. “I’ll come take a look. Paisen, you need some sutures on those cuts, too.”

“Later,” she told him. “Get dressed, I’ll cover you – clothes are over by the wall.”

Rath stood and carefully picked his way over the two dying Group employees, whose blood was rapidly pooling across the floor. He saw the shiny coils of an intestine, and shuddered. Near the wall, he found a garbage bag containing his clothes. His Forge sat next to the bag. He gave the backpack a quick pat, and then dug into the clothes bag.

“You’re the detective?” Paisen asked Beauceron.

“I am.”

“Martin Beauceron, meet Paisen Oryx,” Rath said.

Beauceron held up a hand. “Hello.”

“Are there any more outside?” Paisen asked.

“No,” Beauceron shook his head. “The three others are dead, and my friend is outside. He’s badly hurt.”

“Only three others? There were more. Two military-grade transports, and about a dozen mercenaries.”

Beauceron shook his head. “Just one van, and three guards when we got here. The others must have left.”

“Where are we?” Rath asked, buckling his belt.

“In the barn of an abandoned cattle ranch, a few miles north of the penal colony.”

Paisen pointed at Rath. “Go secure the ranch, and see about his friend. I’ll join you in a minute.”

Outside, Rath let Beauceron lead the way back to the ranch house.

“You brought Alexei, huh?”

“Mm-hm,” Beauceron said. “He insisted.”

They crossed through the house. On the porch, Beauceron knelt next to the old policeman and shook him lightly. “Alexei?” He touched two fingers to his throat. “Alexei!”

With a grunt, Beauceron shifted Rozhkov’s body, laying him down and preparing to do chest compressions. Rath put a hand on Beauceron’s arm, gently stopping him.

“Martin, with my auditory implants, I can hear your heartbeat from here. But I can’t hear his. We’re too late.”

“No, we’re not! If we rush him to a hospital ….” Beauceron protested.

“The penal colony only has a basic infirmary,” Rath pointed out. “The nearest surgical hospital is hours away.”

Beauceron sobbed, clenching his fists in frustration.

“Martin,” Rath said, gently. “I’m sorry.”

Beauceron turned away, and then stood and walked down off the porch, out into the grasses. Rath decided to leave him to his grief. He took Rozhkov’s pistol and checked the chamber, tucking the weapon into his waistband. Then he saw Rozhkov’s badge, hanging from his belt. He tugged it free.

Paisen appeared in the kitchen and saw Rath, then Rozhkov’s inert form.

“Didn’t make it?” she asked.

“No,” Rath said.

“We need to clear out of here in case that collection team decides to come back,” Paisen told him.

“Are we under surveillance?” Rath asked, standing.

“Not that I can tell, but I didn’t spend long looking. And these guards probably have a reporting timetable – they might have already missed a scheduled report to Headquarters.”

Rath nodded. “Martin,” he called. “We need to go.”

Beauceron turned, and they could see the tears still wet on his cheeks as he walked back to the house. At the porch, Rath handed him Rozhkov’s badge.

“Thank you,” Beauceron said. He touched the badge’s metal shield, tracing the chiseled lines of the Interstellar Police insignia.

Paisen cleared her throat. “This is where we part ways,” she told Beauceron.

“What?” Rath asked.

“No offense, Detective,” Paisen continued, flashing Rath a look of warning, “but I just don’t trust IP, retired or otherwise. Either you’re a straight-up guy, in which case you’ll want to arrest us, or you’re dirty, in which case you’ll want to turn us in to the Group for the bounty. I appreciate your help, but—”

“No,” Beauceron interrupted. He pointed at Rozhkov. “That man was like a father to me. And I promised him I would bring the Janus Group down. You owe your lives to him.”

“I don’t owe anyone anything,” Paisen told him.

“But our aims are the same,” Rath told her. “Find the Group, take it down.”

“I’m going with you,” Beauceron stated.

“Paisen,” Rath said. “The Group is going to be after him, too, when they figure out what happened here.”

She shrugged. “Not my problem.”

“He can help,” Rath pleaded.

“We don’t need his help.”

“He almost caught me – twice – when I was still running missions.”

Paisen snorted. “Somehow I don’t think that’s saying much.”

Rath crossed his arms. “Well, I don’t go if he doesn’t go.”

Beauceron looked at Rath, then Paisen. “Why are you trying to find the Janus Group?” he asked her.

“I want my money,” she answered.

“And if you can find the Group, and steal it back – what then?”

“Then I disappear.”

“What good is that money if you have to live your life on the run?”

“I’m already living on the run. Money would make things a whole lot easier. And a lot better than a life spent in jail,” she added.

“You won’t go to jail,” Rath broke in. “Martin, if I turn myself in, that will be enough, right? You don’t need two witnesses.”

“You’re going to turn yourself in?” Paisen asked.

“That was our deal,” Rath said. “Martin helps me find you, I help him gather evidence and testify against the Group.”

Paisen shook her head. “Unbelievable. And you trust Rath to do it?” she asked Beauceron.

He shrugged. “I did. Until he knocked me out and then broke you out of prison.”

“That makes two of us that are sore about that.” She frowned at Beauceron, and then sighed. “This team can’t get any more dysfunctional, I suppose. So fuck it. Let’s go.”

2

Dasi felt the restraints around her wrists release without warning. When nothing else happened for several seconds, she reached up and removed the helmet that had effectively blinded and deafened her during the shuttle’s landing. She found herself seated at the shuttle’s hatch, facing outwards – the sudden daylight forced her to close her eyes. She shivered in the chill wind. When she could see, she walked down out of the ship, alighting on a patch of gravel. Ahead of her, a gap in the high cement walls led to a passageway and more of the strange, illuminated arrows she had seen on the transport ship. She followed the arrows.

They took her to another landing pad, where an automated air car stood idling, the passenger door open. Dasi glanced around, but seeing no one else, she climbed into the car, and shut the door behind her. The car lifted off immediately, and as it rose into the sky, she saw she had landed on a densely-wooded, mountainous island in the midst of a dark, grey sea. The car took her out over the water; on the horizon, she spotted some kind of structure riding the choppy waves – not a ship, but a type of deep sea platform.

The air car landed on the upper deck of the platform, and Dasi saw a woman emerge from a hatch in the platform’s super-structure, and hurry over to the car. Dasi opened the door and climbed out. The woman shut the car’s door for her, and waited as the car took off again, the engines roaring and sending a wash of hot air over the two women. When it was gone, she surveyed Dasi.

“Well,” she sighed, “you must be Dasi.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m Bekka. You better follow me.” She walked back toward the hatch.

Dasi followed. “What is this place? Where am I?”

“You don’t know?” Bekka asked, looking over her shoulder. “Jesus, I don’t know who thought it would be a good idea to send you here. I’m sorry, this is all just … highly unusual. So I’m not quite sure what to do with you.”

Inside the hatch, Dasi saw an armed security guard waiting for them next to a bank of elevators. The elevator opened as they approached, and all three boarded; Bekka pressed a button. Then she suddenly reached out and held the doors open, peering back out at the platform. “Where are your personal effects?”

“My what?”

“Your luggage – clothes and things. Did you leave them on the shuttle, or the air car?”

“No, I didn’t bring any, they – they didn’t let me pack first.”

“Of course they didn’t.”

“I’m sorry ….” Dasi bit her lip. Don’t cry. It’s just for a short time, like Charl said.

But if Bekka noticed her distress, she ignored it, and the guard stayed silent as well. Instead, the woman took her to a supply room, where Dasi was given several sets of medical scrubs and a few towels. Next they went to a room marked CANTEEN, where Bekka filled a plastic bag with toiletries and handed it to her. Finally, she led Dasi down a set of stairs and along a narrow corridor, before opening a door to a small bedroom suite.

“This is you,” Bekka told her. “Communal bathrooms are at the end of the hall. I’ll let you get unpacked, or … settled, at least. I need to take care of some things, but I’ll be back in an hour or so.”

“Okay,” Dasi said.

Bekka eyed the guard. “Watch over her?”

“Sure,” he agreed.

Bekka left. Dasi stood in the door to her room, clothes and linens in her arms. She stepped in and set them down on a narrow bed. In addition to a chest of drawers and clothes closet, the room had a small desk, an easy chair, and a viewscreen mounted on the wall, but no windows. Dasi realized the door was still open, the guard watching her from the hall.

“Can I close this?” she asked, feeling awkward.

“Go ahead,” he shrugged.

She shut the door and took a long, ragged breath. Then she put her scrubs away in the chest of drawers. Finally, she turned on the viewscreen. She spent some time searching for internet access, but all she could find was a large entertainment library – no search or browser functionality.

They probably disabled it … they don’t want me to know where I am, or what this place is. Whoever ‘they’ are.

She had nearly finished a drama show when Bekka returned. The administrator knocked briefly, then opened the door – Dasi saw the guard still standing outside in the hall, but Bekka dismissed him. The woman sat down in Dasi’s desk chair; Dasi sat on her bed.

“Well,” Bekka said. “We’d better start with some house rules.”

“Okay,” Dasi agreed.

Bekka handed her a keycard – it had her name and photo on it, and a clip to attach to her clothes. “Wear this at all times. You’ll find that certain areas are off-limits to you – if you swipe the card at a locked door and the door doesn’t open, that’s somewhere you shouldn’t be.”

“Okay.”

“There are a lot of places here that you shouldn’t be,” Bekka emphasized, looking Dasi in the eye. “So rule number one is: don’t go poking around. You won’t have a guard babysitting you at all times, but we can and will do that, if needed.”

“I understand.”

“Good. Basically, your card lets you access the living quarters on this level, the cafeteria, which is two floors down, and the recreation area, which is up above decks, outside near where you landed. There are sports courts and a workout area, that kind of thing. But that brings me to rule number two.” Bekka shifted in her seat. “You do not talk to anyone on board this facility other than me.”

“Okay,” Dasi said.

“You’re going to see some doctors and nurses, guards, and other administrative personnel like me. But you don’t interact with anyone else. Understand?”

“Yes,” Dasi said.

“They’ve all been given similar instructions to avoid you, so it shouldn’t be a problem.”

“What if I have a question or a problem?”

“You can find me at any time,” Bekka assured her. “I’ve enabled internal chat on your viewscreen, you just need to tell it to ping me. But let me be a little blunt here: if it’s questions like ‘what time is dinner?’ that’s fine. But most other questions I’m not allowed to answer.”

“Okay,” Dasi said.

“Now, we’ve had something of a staff meeting to figure out what to do with you, and the long and short of it is, we don’t know. So as usual, they’re leaving it to me to decide. I’m trying to figure out a job we can give you, because otherwise you’re liable to go a bit stir crazy. What are your skills?”

“My skills?” Dasi asked. “My degree is in public relations – that’s what I did before … all this.”

Bekka stared at her.

“… but this doesn’t look like the kind of place that seeks publicity,” Dasi finished lamely.

“No,” Bekka agreed. “I imagine you have solid managerial skills, but I don’t need anyone else in Operations, and that’s all sensitive anyway. Do you have any medical training?”

Dasi frowned. “No. I mean, I took CPR years ago, but … no.”

“Ever worked on hardware? Electronics repair?”

“No.”

Bekka sighed.

“I can cook …?” Dasi suggested.

“Food processing is all automated here,” Bekka said.

“Oh.” Dasi pushed her hair back over her ear. “Can you tell me where ‘here’ is?”

Bekka frowned. “No. That’s one of those questions I’m not allowed to answer.” She stood up. “I’d better think some more about what job to give you. I’ll be back tomorrow.”

* * *

“Chief of Operations to see you, ma’am.”

Director Nkosi checked her calendar, noting that this was an unscheduled appointment. She tapped the screen of her datascroll, notifying her assistant to admit Feykin into her office.

“Yes?” she asked, when he had closed the door.

“Ma’am,” he said. “I’m sorry to bother you. I received a strange notification from the human resources lead at the training facility.”

“Indeed?” She cocked an eyebrow at him. “And why am I being involved in personnel affairs on Fusoria?”

“Apparently an unscheduled visitor arrived earlier today.”

“Unscheduled? A candidate?”

“No, ma’am.” Feykin cleared his throat. “Her name is Dasi Apter.”

“That name rings a bell. Anchorpoint, the mess with Senator Lizelle?”

“Yes, that’s her. After he informed us of the situation, it seems Senator Lizelle predicted our response, and picked her up while 700 was busy with her boyfriend. The senator then used his Group access codes to request a transport, and sent her directly to Fusoria with orders to hold her there. That’s why we were unable to find her afterwards – she was en route to Fusoria while we were searching.”

Nkosi leaned back in her chair, hands steepled under her chin. Feykin stayed silent.

“What do we know about Ms. Apter?” she asked.

“She was on Senator Lizelle’s staff, as a PR specialist. Her boyfriend wrote the program that exposed Senator Lizelle’s involvement with the Group.”

“But she doesn’t know the identity of the other two senators?”

“Not according to the testimony 700 obtained from her boyfriend. None of them did, and according to the lawyer, Lizelle took possession of the data files directly from the lawyer.”

“To protect his fellow senators.”

Feykin nodded. “Their anonymity – and their ability to expose our operations – ensure their safety.”

Nkosi’s mouth twisted into a half-smile. “Perhaps not for long. Now that Senator Lizelle has been forced to identify himself, we have a unique opportunity. Thank you, Feykin.” She spent several seconds sending a brief message from her computer. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to make a call.”

“Of course. But … the senator’s aide? Fusoria is requesting disposition instructions.”

“Mm. She’s a liability. But if Lizelle is that desperate to keep her alive, I wonder if his personal feelings are clouding his objectivity. She could be a useful bargaining chip, should we need it. Have them keep her safe, for now.”

“Ma’am.” Feykin let himself out.

Nkosi drummed her fingers on her desk, lost in thought, until the secure call notification appeared on her computer. As always, the senators’ voices were garbled electronically to hide their identity.

“What’s the emergency, Director?”

“… and why is the third member of our committee not on the line?” the second senator added.

“She knows who he is,” the first senator broke in. “There’s no use protecting his identity any longer.”

“Senators,” Nkosi announced. “I’m faced with delivering some awkward news which is best discussed without Senator Lizelle on the line. You’re both aware of the incident that occurred as a result of the artificial intelligence research project that Senator Lizelle decided to sponsor.”

“We are.”

“And we agreed, when we discussed it, that the appropriate response was to remove all risks from that situation,” Nkosi continued. “Both the programmer and the lawyer are no longer threats to this organization – or yourselves. However, the programmer’s girlfriend eluded capture. I discovered today that she was aided in her escape by Senator Lizelle, who decided to send her to our training facility.”

“Well, the girl was on his staff – he knew her well, I’m sure,” one of the senators replied. “He notified you that that was his preference?”

“He did not,” Nkosi told them. “I had assumed that he discussed the matter with you two.”

“Well, he didn’t. Not with me at least.”

“Nor I.”

“I might have agreed to it,” the first continued, “though it seems an unusual and unnecessary risk.”

“It troubles me that he would take such unprecedented action without consulting either of you, or, indeed, informing me,” Nkosi observed. She let the senators consider her comment in silence for a time.

“It is troubling. Are you asking us for permission to kill the girl, now that you have her?” the second senator finally asked.

“If you see fit,” Nkosi told them.

“No,” the second senator said. “We make decisions as a group. Or at least, we should be doing that, damn it. There are three of us for a reason. We’ll discuss this with Charl at our next opportunity. Until then, the girl lives.”

“As you wish,” Nkosi agreed. The line clicked off, and she smiled to herself.

3

“Not the spaceport?” Beauceron asked, tapping on the air car’s navigation screen.

“No. Head for Rogan Dan,” Paisen told him.

“What’s Rogan Dan?” Rath asked.

“A settlement outside of Monrovia Central,” Paisen answered. “Hand me your Forge.”

Rath passed the backpack to the front seat, where Paisen opened the device and waited as the nanobots sprung to life, a grenade slowly emerging in the tray.

“Wait a minute,” Beauceron said, glancing over. “What’s that for?”

“Disabling security cameras,” Paisen answered tersely. “Rath, why are your supply levels so low on this thing?”

“I had to build a lot of stuff for my final mission, then a lot of EMP grenades to escape the Group. I didn’t get a chance to top it off before my escape.”

She shook her head. “Sloppy.”

Rath shot her a sour look. “Okay, mom.”

She narrowed her eyes at him.

“Sorry,” he said, quickly.

“Why do we need to disable security cameras?” Beauceron asked.

“You don’t. You just need to sit in the parking lot.”

“Not without telling me what you’re going to do,” Beauceron protested. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t particularly want to help an assassin without knowing exactly what she’s doing.”

“Nor do I particularly want a babysitter,” Paisen replied. “I’m going to retrieve my own Forge, since this one has less than half a tank. I also have some money there. We’re going to need both.”

“That’s it?” Beauceron asked.

“That’s it.”

“And you need to break in somewhere to get it?” Beauceron asked.

“Yes.”

“And you’re not going to kill anyone,” Beauceron prompted.

“I’m not expecting to,” Paisen replied. “But the last time I went inside this building I got caught and sent to a radiation-soaked hell hole. I’m not going to let that happen again.”

Paisen picked up the finished grenade. On the tray in front of her, Rath saw the butt of an auto-pistol take shape. He sighed and shook his head.

Here comes another argument.

* * *

Less than an hour later, Beauceron flared the air car to a stop over the laboratory, and then settled down near the building’s front entrance. Rath saw a sign that read High Energy Research and Development – a Division of Armadyne. Paisen reached for the door handle, but Beauceron put his hand on her arm.

“Stun darts only,” he reminded her.

“Christ,” she said. “I got my fifty, they don’t give extra credit for more kills, okay?”

“Say it,” Beauceron repeated.

“Stun rounds only,” she said. She climbed out, slammed the door and strode across the parking lot.

“I don’t like this,” Beauceron said. “I’ve been an accessory to enough crimes lately.”

“Think of it this way,” Rath suggested. “Is it better to be an accessory, and keeping Paisen in check, or go home knowing she’s running around, doing whatever she wants?”

Beauceron twisted in his seat and looked at Rath in the rear view mirror. “You’d prefer I not keep her in check?”

“No, I’ve seen enough killing – I don’t want to be party to it any more than you do. But you and Rozhkov did kill those guards at the ranch house today.”

“I wish we hadn’t needed to,” Beauceron said. “It was in self-defense, I suppose, but ….”

“Kill or be killed,” Rath said. “I know. That’s not why I started killing, but it’s certainly how I felt by the time it was over.”

“And if you have to kill again?”

“I don’t know,” Rath said. “Most of my training was about making killing a reflex, so that you can kill without thinking about it. But now … I can’t do anything except think about it.”

“Even if it was in self-defense?” Beauceron persisted.

“I don’t know,” Rath said.

Abruptly, the doors to the building swung open, and Paisen jogged out, carrying a dirt-streaked over-the-shoulder messenger bag. She was holding the auto-pistol in one hand, Rath saw.

“Oh boy.”

Beauceron started the air car. Paisen rounded the back of a car several rows over and dropped to a knee, steadying the pistol on the car’s trunk. For several seconds, nothing happened, and then the doors opened again, and two security guards burst out at a full sprint. Paisen fired two rounds.

“Were those stun darts?” Beauceron asked.

“Yeah,” Rath said. “The guards are still twitching.”

Beauceron slewed to a halt behind her, and Paisen turned and opened the door, sliding in. Beauceron pushed the throttle forward, pouring power into the air car’s engines.

“Now we head for the spaceport,” she said. “No talking, I need to make a phone call.”

Rath watched as she removed a data drive from the Forge’s front pocket, slotted it into the car’s port, and then accessed a set of files. Paisen typed in a URL from memory, and then uploaded the files to the address. Next she placed a phone call.

“Yes?”

“Confirming delivery for job number eight-three-two-six,” Paisen reported.

“Stand by,” the voice told her. “That’s an inactive job code.”

“I’d like to reactivate it,” Paisen shot back.

“Wait a moment, I’ll need to contact the original requester.”

“I’ll be here,” Paisen told him.

In the distance ahead of them, a shuttle launched itself into orbit.

Beauceron pointed at it. “We’ll be at the spaceport in a few minutes.”

“Yeah, I see it,” Paisen said.

The man came back on the phone. “Your original contract has passed its expiration date, but I’ve been instructed to tell you the requester is willing to honor the contract at a forty percent discount.”

Paisen swore. “Tell him I’ll give him twenty percent off, final offer.”

“Stand by … your offer is accepted.”

Paisen typed on the screen. “I’ve sent you the encryption key.”

“I have it. Your account has been credited with two hundred thousand dollars. Good day.”

“Two hundred grand?” Rath asked. “What’s on that thing?”

“Engineering schematics for a prototype,” Paisen told him. She pocketed the data drive. “Maybe we’ll build one on the Forges later on and have some fun. But first: we get off this fucking dust ball.”

* * *

Paisen finished eating and set her empty plate back on the cabin’s desk. On the bulkhead over the desk, the viewscreen showed a map of their spaceliner’s progress, between advertisements for tourist destinations and in-flight upgrades. She shut it off and took a seat on one of the cabin’s bunks.

“Okay, mission planning. Let’s start with inventory.”

Rath nodded, but saw Beauceron frowning, so he explained. “We inventory what we have, our equipment and capabilities – know yourself first, or know your team, in this case. That gives us a sense for what we can do, given those resources.”

“I’ll start,” Paisen said. “Minor electrical burn damage, some damage to lungs from forced oxygen deprivation, and lacerations on the arms and legs. My hemobots should have that healed in under twenty-four hours.”

“Wait, you still have your hemobots?” Rath asked.

“You don’t?”

“No,” Rath said. “How did you keep them in?”

“I hired a bioprogrammer to rewire them. The same guy that disconnected my feed to Headquarters, and rebooted my implants. You do still have your implants, right?”

“Yeah, of course.”

Paisen shook her head. “Well, at least there’s that. You’re much less combat effective without the hemobots, though. Back to inventory - hemobots and full implants, degraded physical capabilities, but fully mission capable in twenty-four hours. One working Forge, with eighty-five percent full replenishment canisters.” She shot Rath a stern look. “No weapons forged. Three hundred and two thousand dollars in cash reserves.”

Rath cleared his throat. “Full implants, no hemobots. Shrapnel wound left leg, gunshot wounds left shoulder, right leg – all in advanced stages of healing.”

“How long until you’re one hundred percent?” Paisen asked.

“I don’t know,” Rath admitted. “Hard to tell without the nanos in there monitoring for me. Another month, probably? Forge with forty percent replenishment canisters, phone, three hundred in cash, no weapons.”

“Three hundred thousand?” Paisen asked.

“Uh, no. Three hundred. Total,” Rath admitted.

They looked at Beauceron. “Um, I’m not sick or hurt. I have fresh clothes in my suitcase, but I’m running out of toothpaste. I have some money.”

“How much?” Paisen asked.

“I get a monthly payment from my pension, and I have eighty thousand or so saved.”

“Do you still have your police ID?” Paisen asked.

“No, they took it from me. I have Rozhkov’s badge, though.”

Paisen pursed her lips. “Hold on to it – we might need it. Rath could always impersonate him.”

Beauceron opened his mouth to protest, but Rath cut in first. “Let’s talk mission objectives. What’s our desired end state?”

“The Janus Group exposed, all employees arrested, an actionable amount of evidence collected,” Beauceron replied.

Paisen shook her head. “No. The Group needs to be neutralized as a threat. Exposing them doesn’t necessarily do that.”

“It might, though,” Rath said.

“We don’t know enough about the organization,” Paisen told him. “They might have fail safes in place in case leadership gets caught. Then the company continues to function as if nothing happened – and is still pursuing us. And I want to be clear: neutralizing the Group is only a defensive measure – I want what’s owed me.”

“Blood money,” Beauceron pointed out.

“Call it what you want, I earned it.” She pointed at Rath. “So did he.”

Beauceron met her gaze silently. Rath fidgeted in his chair. “I think we can argue about the exact end goals later,” he said. “First we need to find them. Then we can decide what to do about it.”

“So where are they?” Beauceron asked.

“I don’t know,” Paisen said.

Rath turned to face her. “You don’t know? I thought you had a plan … I thought you knew someone at Headquarters.”

“I did. And I know where Headquarters was. But … they’re smarter than I anticipated.”

Beauceron crossed his arms. “You better catch us up.”

Paisen sat forward on the bunk. “After my fortieth kill, I was on the spaceliner, getting a drink at the bar on my way back to my home station, when a woman started hitting on me. It was just small talk, and I was tired, so I tried to brush her off and go back to my cabin, but she was persistent. And after a minute I recognized her voice: she had given me mission updates during an assignment a year or two before, over the radio. I realized it was no coincidence she had approached me during faster-than-light travel.”

“That’s the one time we’re not streaming our audio-visual feed to Headquarters,” Rath clarified.

“Right,” Paisen agreed. “So I played along, and let her think I was into her, too … and eventually invited her back to my cabin. When we got inside, she confessed everything in a rush – how she’d been watching me, and had fallen in love, and wanted to save me from the Group. She told me what they did to contractors that completed their fifty kills.”

“You believed her?” Rath asked.

“She had no reason to lie to me. And … I questioned her. Extensively.”

“Your tortured her?” Beauceron asked.

Paisen shrugged. “I wouldn’t call it torture. But I needed to know the truth.”

“And once you knew, why did you continue in the program? You still had ten kills to go,” Beauceron pointed out.

“I needed time.”

“To figure out how to escape,” Rath guessed. “What did you learn about the Group? What did she tell you?”

“They have a single headquarters building, where all techs and supervisors are located. They’re not split up in remote cells or anything like that. The Group is set up as a private company, run by a single family – they pass down leadership from generation to generation. Only the most senior supervisors know the identity of that family. They are highly profitable – they pay employees extremely well, so that tends to keep folks in line. But employees are also monitored, just like contractors. Hemobots and audio-visual feed, and the minute the Group senses one of them is stepping out of line, they flip the kill switch.”

Rath rubbed at his jaw. “We know how that goes.”

“She gave you the location of Headquarters?” Beauceron asked.

“Yeah,” Paisen said. “And I checked it out, after I escaped. But that was four years later, they were gone – it was just some software development company.”

“You’re sure that wasn’t just a front?” Beauceron asked.

“I’m sure. I got a job there for a short while. Most boring month of my life. And eventually I got the rental records from the real estate company – a company called ‘New Horizons Wealth Management’ had leased the space at the time the tech was working there.” She watched as Beauceron took note of the name in his notebook. “Before you ask: yes, I searched for them. According to public records, they went out of business at the same time the lease ended.”

“They set up a new front company under a different name each time they change locations,” Rath guessed.

“Probably. So that’s a dead end.”

“What else did she tell you?” Beauceron asked. “Number of employees at Headquarters, number of contractors in operation … anything?”

Paisen blew out a long breath. “Not really. They don’t tell low-level mission technicians much at all – just what they need to know. Plus, it was a short flight, and I was more concerned with getting information that would help me escape.”

“Well, she’s still at Headquarters, right? If we can figure out a way to contact her, maybe we can arrange another meet-up,” Rath suggested.

“Mmm … no,” Paisen said.

“Why not?”

“Because she’s not still at Headquarters.”

Beauceron put his pencil down. “You killed her?”

Paisen sighed. “Beauceron, you have got to stop asking questions that you don’t want answered.”

“She didn’t deserve that,” Rath muttered.

“Don’t you start in on me, too,” Paisen warned him. “Of course she didn’t deserve it. But you know better than anyone – deserve has nothing to do with it. I wasn’t prepared to escape yet, and I couldn’t let her go back to Headquarters – what if she confessed? I didn’t have much of a choice.”

“What was her name?” Beauceron asked.

Paisen glared at him, then looked away. “Laney.”

They were silent for a time, and then Paisen stood up. “After I ran out of options looking for Headquarters, I shifted my search to concentrate on the planet where we were trained. Laney told me the Group owns that planet, or at least colonization rights to it.”

“But Headquarters isn’t there,” Rath said.

“No,” Paisen agreed.

“They might have moved it there,” Beauceron noted. “We don’t know.”

“It’s possible,” Paisen allowed. “I was more thinking the employees on the planet would be able to tell me where Headquarters was. Or better yet, someone there would have access to Group financial accounts.”

“Beauceron and I looked for the training planet, too,” Rath said. “Found a cyber-doc on Alberon who had done a surgical rotation there, but they were careful not to let him know where he was going.”

“Yeah, makes sense. But there would be full-time employees there, too – administrative staff to handle the surgical teams, and someone was monitoring the drones that took us through Selection, controlling them, talking to us through them.”

“It’s our best lead,” Beauceron agreed. “Did you make any progress?”

Paisen sighed. “Does eliminating possibilities count? I sifted through internet archives for every planet humans have ever visited or sent a drone to. I narrowed it down to planets with human-compatible gravity, atmosphere, and climate, and then manually reviewed survey data for each. That’s over thirty thousand planets, by the way.”

“And?”

“And none of them fit the bill.”

“Do you think the Janus Group discovered a planet on their own? A habitable planet that no one else knows about?” Beauceron asked.

Paisen shrugged. “What does it matter? All I know for sure is it’s not publicly listed.”

Rath looked at Beauceron. “What about the mobile kitchens angle?”

Beauceron leaned back in his chair and rubbed his temple. “Mm, perhaps.” He looked at Paisen. “I met a journalist by the name of Mehta, several years ago – he had discovered that the Janus Group was using mobile kitchens to test new recruits. You chatted with him online, actually – that’s how we found you.

“They murdered Mehta and his family when they discovered his investigation,” Beauceron continued. “We could try following his lead, locating a recruit and shadowing them. But … it will be challenging in the extreme to find one. I doubt they’re still using kitchens any more – they know that Mehta discovered that method, they will have switched to something new. And even if we find a recruit, we’d need someone waiting on the transfer station at all times, ready to do a spacewalk to set a tracking device on the hull of the ship.”

Rath chewed on his thumb, watching as Paisen stood and paced the small cabin.

After a minute, Beauceron spoke. “Mehta wanted to find the training planet, too. And he failed.”

“Mehta was foolish,” Paisen told him. “You don’t advertise to your enemies that you’re investigating them.” She raised an eyebrow questioningly. “That was an encrypted chat, I followed standard protocols. How did you find me, exactly?”

“You encrypted the chat,” Rath explained. “And routed through multiple proxy servers, just like they taught us. But I know a hacker; he was able to triangulate your origin to the Territories, and then we accessed their criminal databases and found your arrest record.”

Beauceron tapped his pencil idly on the cover of his notebook, thinking. “Wait, how did he find her location?”

“Um. He traced her through the proxy servers—”

“No,” Beauceron interrupted. “You said he triangulated.”

“Okay,” Rath agreed. “So?”

“Where did you fly to the training planet from?”

“My home planet. Tarkis.”

“And how long were you on that flight?”

“About a week? There was no clock.”

“And you, Paisen?”

“Delta Copernica. It was longer than a week. Maybe ten, eleven sleep cycles.”

Beauceron drew two dots on the notepad, and then a wide circle around each. Where the two circles overlapped, he shaded the area in. He held up the makeshift diagram for them to see. “I think I know how to find the training planet.”

* * *

When a full hour had passed with no activity at the ranch house, the man broke cover and stood up. He lifted the camouflage veil over his head, revealing a mass of pink burn scars. Still wearing his grass-covered ghillie suit, 700 jogged toward the ranch, cradling a scoped rifle in his crossed arms. As he neared the house, he slowed, and brought the weapon to his shoulder. He approached and inspected each of the bodies in turn, discovering another body inside the house, near one of the windows. The rest of the house was abandoned. He spent some time examining the tall, grey-haired man’s body, sifting through his pockets for anything useful. Then he took a clear picture of the man’s face.

At the barn, he slid the door open, and found the interrogation theater still set up, bright lights blazing on empty tables. Between the tables, two bodies lay in a pool of congealed blood and entrails. With the toe of his boot, he flipped one of the bodies over, then gave the room a final scan, capturing it all on his video stream. When he was finished, he walked back outside, and established a connection with his air car, which was parked on the plain several miles away, over the horizon.

“Auto-pilot on. Come to my location,” he ordered.

He propped his rifle against the side of the barn and pulled out his phone, waiting for the encryption procedure.

“700 for the director,” he told the automated system, when the connection was established.

He had to wait another two minutes for Director Nkosi to connect, during which time his air car appeared, and then hovered in for a landing.

“Yes?” she asked.

“Did you see the footage?”

“Not yet.”

“Collection team’s dead, 339 and 621 are gone.”

He heard an intake of breath over the line. “How?”

“It looks like an external party intervened. I’ve got a dead older male, not a Group employee, who appears to have been killed in a shoot-out with our team. Sent you his face, if you want to run it.”

“We will.”

“There was an incident in the local news, as well. A woman broke into an R&D lab, stunned half the security force, and then flew away. I’d put money on that being 339.”

“Yes. The Crisis Team here noted that, too.”

“Did 339 and 621 get on a flight after that?”

“We believe so,” she told him.

“So tell me where to go.”

4

Dasi finished mopping the cafeteria after breakfast, and then wheeled her mop and bucket onto the service elevator, and tapped the button for the living quarters. The hallways there took her another thirty minutes, after which she worked her way through the gym and indoor recreation center. As always, the other staffers took care to avoid her, and the only words directed at her were the occasional Excuse me as someone maneuvered around her.

After the rec center, she tucked the mop back into the cleaning closet, and grabbed an empty trash bag before riding up to the platform level. She spent ten minutes walking over the air car landing platform, looking for debris that might get caught in the car’s engines when it next landed, and tossing what little she found into the trash bag. That done, she continued her trash search around the rest of the platform, stopping from time to time to pick up a discarded tissue or piece of gum. She was finished with her rounds well before lunchtime.

As usual.

She sighed, and stuffed the half-empty trash bag into a garbage can, then took a seat on a bench looking out over the waves toward the island. To her surprise, the air car was in flight – she watched it approach, then hover in for a landing. She twisted on the bench to watch, and saw two men emerge from a hatch in the super-structure. They walked to the car, and one boarded the car. The car took off immediately, and headed back to the island.

What’s that all about?

The car disappeared into the distance, eventually blending into the far-off land mass of the island. Dasi held her thumb up at arm’s length, closing one eye and trying to judge the distance to the island.

Who am I kidding? I don’t know how far it is, or how to get there. I don’t even know what’s on the island.

Other than the shuttle.

* * *

Slowly, carefully, Dasi began testing the limits of her captivity. Her keycard gave her full access to most of the living areas of the platform, but the medical floors were off limits, as was all of the super-structure that rose above the facility’s upper platforms. There were sub-levels, too, she discovered – apparently some people lived or worked under the water line, but her keycard didn’t let her activate those buttons on the elevators.

There were datascrolls in the rec center – Dasi found them on her second day. She looked around furtively, then picked one up, turning it on. But just as with her viewscreen, all communications functions and internet connectivity had been disabled – apparently the people running the platform didn’t trust any of its inhabitants to have access to the outside world.

The loneliness was what finally drove Dasi over the edge. With no one to talk to, she dwelt more and more on Khyron’s murder. She replayed their final days together in her mind – how she had betrayed his trust in a moment of weakness, then kept it a secret from him. How Lizelle had saved her, but had let this mysterious organization kill Khyron. And how she had been powerless to do anything. Wracked with grief and guilt, she cried herself to sleep each night. She caught herself talking to reruns of TV shows on her viewscreen for companionship, and later, eavesdropping on conversations in the cafeteria, desperate for any human contact. The uncertainty of her situation gnawed at her nerves, and she finally reached out to Bekka, calling her four times at the end of her second week at the platform.

The first two times, the administrator answered, and spent some time talking to Dasi. She expressed some sympathy over her isolated situation, but reiterated firmly why it was necessary.

“When can I go home?” Dasi asked.

“I don’t know,” Bekka said.

“Can you find out?” Dasi asked.

“I’ll try.”

The third time, Dasi could tell the woman was becoming exasperated with her – their conversation was brief, after Bekka confirmed Dasi didn’t need anything specific. The fourth time, Bekka didn’t even answer her call.

Dasi focused on the air car first. She had learned to fly air cars growing up, and reasoned that it was the fastest, best route off the platform. After she finished her cleaning duties, she made it a habit of spending most days above decks, either exercising or reading books on a datascroll. But despite her efforts to log the flights and determine a pattern, the air car only rarely made the flight to and from the island. When Dasi made a half-hearted attempt to approach it while it was parked on the landing pad, a stern voice came over the loudspeaker, frightening her.

“Stay away from the landing pad.”

She nodded and hurried inside.

It’s automated, anyway – they’d probably just shut it down the moment I got inside.

Three nights later, Dasi’s alarm woke her just before three in the morning. She climbed out of bed and dressed in silence, bundling herself in several layers to ward off the cool night air. She cracked open her door, half-expecting to see one of the guards waiting for her. But the corridor was empty. She resisted the urge to tiptoe, and hurried down the hall to the cleaning closet. At the back of a storage unit, she pulled out a duffle bag which held several gallon jugs of water and a week’s supply of food that she had snuck out of the cafeteria – granola bars, fruit, and some sealed meal packs. Dasi shouldered the bag, and quietly closed the door.

She took the external fire stairs up to the platform, afraid that she might run into a guard or other night shift worker in the elevators. It took her five minutes to climb up to the top deck, winding her way up the massive pylons that supported the platform, and she was sweating and breathing hard when she finally emerged near the landing pad. The air car sat, silent and dark, but Dasi ignored it and hurried across the open deck, through the recreation area and to the edge of the platform. She peered over the edge.

Oh god, it’s higher than I thought.

Several feet below her, an emergency lifeboat hung from a pair of winch arms, suspended hundreds of feet above the dark waters below. Nearly three feet of yawning empty space separated her from the lifeboat, however. Dasi swung her bag of supplies back and then tossed it forward, watching as it dropped into the rear of the lifeboat.

Okay, that’s not that far. You can do it.

Closing her eyes, she jumped.

She landed heavily, and with an audible thump. Her heart pounded in her chest, but if anyone on the platform had heard her jump, they gave no indication of it. She stood up, tucked the supply bag into the covered section of the lifeboat, and made her way to the center of the small craft. It rocked slightly in the air; the feeling made her queasy.

Now the winches.

She leaned out from the lifeboat, reaching back to the edge of the platform, fumbling to find the release switches for the winch arms in the dark. Finally, she had them. She grasped one in each hand, and with a deep breath, yanked down hard.

The winches had not been oiled in years, and they screeched in protest as soon as Dasi released them. The lifeboat fell fast – not quite free-falling, but nearly so – and Dasi gave a yelp of alarm, sitting down fast and grabbing one of the benches for support. The noise from the winches was excruciatingly loud.

Nothing I can do about that now.

The lifeboat splashed down seconds later, and the wind whipped some of the spray into Dasi’s face, blinding her momentarily. She wiped her eyes, pushed wet hair out of her face, and then clambered to the stern. The lifeboat’s motor started at the push of a button, and Dasi saw that the wires had released automatically, allowing the boat to float away from the platform.

I’m free!

Dimly, she heard an alarm siren far above her on the platform, but she ignored it and sat down in the stern, taking hold of the boat’s tiller. She had little experience piloting boats before, but after a few false starts, Dasi found that the boat moved in the opposite direction that she pushed the tiller. She pointed the lifeboat at the island, shivering in the wind and spray.

But the lifeboat’s engine was painfully weak – with a sinking feeling, Dasi realized it was probably designed more to provide power to the lifeboat’s life support and communication systems than to propel the craft through the water. She made progress through the waves, the platform slowly receding behind her, but only barely. And before she knew it, she saw searchlights reaching out from the platform’s deck, and saw the air car lift off from its landing pad.

No!

She considered turning back, trying to hide herself amidst the huge pylons beneath the platform, but there was not enough time. She fumbled with the controls to the lifeboat, trying to increase the motor’s power, but she only succeeded in turning on a heater. The air car found her seconds later.

They hovered above the lifeboat, and a security guard jumped out, landing in the bow of the boat. He climbed back to where she sat, crying.

“Please let me go home,” she pleaded. “I just want to go home.”

Without a word, he pushed her roughly aside, taking the controls and pointing the craft back toward the platform. The air car followed them. Ten minutes later, they nosed up against a small pier at the base of one of the pylons.

“Get out,” the man told her. An older man in a security uniform was waiting on the pier – he escorted her up to her room. Bekka stood next to her desk.

“I’m so sorry about this, Captain,” Bekka told the man.

“Next time,” he warned Bekka. “I’m going to let her get to the island.”

“No, I understand,” Bekka told him. “It won’t happen again.”

He left, closing the door behind him. Dasi sat on her bed, her wet hair dripping down her back. She broke into tears again.

“I didn’t do anything,” she told Bekka. “I shouldn’t be here.”

“Dasi, I need you to listen to me. You seem like a nice girl, but if you do something like that again, I won’t be able to protect you. The captain’s a hard man – he’ll take you to the island, he means it.”

“What’s on the island?” Dasi sniffed.

“Nothing but death.” She handed Dasi a towel.

Dasi took the towel and looked up at Bekka. “I can’t go on living like this, just not knowing what’s going to happen to me, ever.”

Bekka sighed. “I don’t know what to tell you.”

“Did they tell you why I’m here?” Dasi asked. “My boyfriend found a—”

“Stop,” Bekka told her, holding up a hand. “I don’t want to know.”

“I didn’t do anything, though. You can let me go, and I promise I won’t tell anyone. I wouldn’t even know what to tell! I don’t understand any of this – I don’t know what this place is, or what the island is for, or where we are.”

Bekka shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I’m not the one who decides what happens to you.”

“Can I talk to someone else, someone who can tell me more?”

“I don’t think so.”

Dasi rubbed her forehead. “Well, can you get a message to Senator Lizelle for me?”

Bekka cocked her head to one side. “Perhaps.”

“Really?” Dasi asked.

“I can try. But not tonight. It’s late. Sleep, write your message, and bring it to me tomorrow.”

5

Beauceron’s scalp itched. Without thinking, he rubbed his hand over the bald skin for the twentieth time. He had suffered from a small bald patch for years, but had never fully shaved his head – he barely recognized himself in the bathroom mirror when Paisen finished with the razor.

“That’s the point,” she reminded him.

The glue under his facial prosthetics itched, too, but Paisen had been adamant on that front, as well. While she and Rath could change their appearance at will, doing so was pointless as long as they traveled with him – as long as he looked the same, security footage and facial recognition software would enable the Janus Group to track them easily.

“I thought prosthetics and makeup don’t work – surveillance software can defeat those measures?” he had asked.

“It can. But it will slow them down. They’ll have to rely more heavily on body type matching – more false positives, more margin of error.”

They all exited the spaceliner at different times, and rode different shuttles down to the surface of Aleppo, just to be safe. Beauceron stared out his window and watched the planet’s massive equatorial canyon open up as they descended into it. Tiered buildings lined the canyon’s walls, stacked vertically like a child’s bricks. Beauceron saw that some apartment buildings appeared to have balconies, but all were enclosed, sealed against the planet’s toxic atmosphere. Farther away down the deep canyon, an industrial plant belched gases into the air.

After leaving the spaceport, Beauceron caught a cab, which zoomed along the canyon’s rim in the air traffic pattern, finally descending near a cluster of buildings with a large enclosed stadium. The cab pulled into a sealed bay, and Beauceron paid, and then made his way inside the building’s entrance. He found Rath and Paisen waiting for him near a reception desk labeled Aleppo Technical College.

“No issues?” Rath asked.

He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Did you double back at the spaceport?” Paisen asked.

“Twice,” Beauceron confirmed. “I pretended to shop for a few minutes, left, and then went back to the shop again. I didn’t see anyone following me.”

Paisen picked up her Forge and slung it over a shoulder. “Let’s go.”

They had to wait nearly an hour, but eventually the class finished. When the room had emptied, Beauceron knocked on the door and leaned inside.

“Professor Entenari?”

A slim woman looked up from the datascroll she was reading. “Yes?”

“Hi.” Beauceron smiled. “May we come in?”

“And who are ‘we’?” she asked, frowning. “You’re not in one of my classes, are you?”

“Ah, no,” Beauceron said. “We’re not students here, actually – but we’re hoping you can help us.”

“Cryptic,” she said. “If this is some marketing research nonsense, you can see yourselves out right now.”

“No, nothing like that,” Beauceron reassured her. “It’s a bit of a strange situation. My father passed away recently, and he left me some money. But he had a bit of a sense of humor – to retrieve the money, I need to solve a riddle.”

Entenari gave a sharp bark of a laugh. “And you want my help in solving it?”

Beauceron gave her a wry smile. “Indeed.”

She indicated Rath and Paisen, who had taken seats in the front row of desks. “And your friends are …?”

“Friends,” Paisen replied, with a disarming smile. “Just tagging along out of curiosity.”

“We couldn’t help him solve it, but now we want to know the answer,” Rath explained.

“Mm.” The professor shot Rath an appraising look, and he suddenly felt self-conscious. “Okay, I’m intrigued. What’s the riddle?”

“It’s a twist on the old arithmetic equations – you know, a hyper-rail train leaves City A traveling X miles per hour, and another train leaves City B ….”

Entenari nodded. “I always found those questions singularly unimaginative, but I’m following you.”

“Okay. The question in this case involves two people leaving different planets. One left from Tarkis and traveled for approximately seven days. The other left Delta Copernica and traveled for approximately eleven days. They both arrived at the same destination, a new planet. The name of that planet is the answer to the riddle.”

“I assume they both traveled using conventional modern methods? Faster-than-light travel, and they took the shortest distance journey possible?”

Beauceron glanced at Rath and Paisen. “Yes,” he said, uncertainly. “The passengers flew in modern spacecraft traveling at FTL speeds.”

“And I think we can assume they didn’t stop along the way,” Paisen said.

“You said they each traveled for ‘approximately’ seven or eleven days. You don’t know the precise timing?”

“Uh, that’s what it said in the riddle. So, no.”

“May I read the riddle?”

Beauceron but his lip. “Um, no. I forgot to bring it.”

“Well, that was foolish. Regardless, it’s a simple question of where their travel potential radii overlap. What you really need is an astro-cartographer, I’m more of a specialist on the physics side. But still, I may be able to help.”

“We’d be willing to pay you for your time,” Rath offered.

Entenari dismissed the notion with a wave of her hand. “Nonsense. I like puzzles.” She stood up, and activated a holographic projector on the ceiling with a snap of her fingers. A virtual star field appeared in the air surrounding the astronomer. “But I fear your father may have played a trick on you.”

“How so?” Beauceron asked. “The riddle seemed to suggest we could triangulate on the location using just the information I gave you.”

“Triangulate? No. We can eliminate a lot of possibilities, but it’s unlikely that will tell us where your mystery planet is, without more precise timing for each trip … down to the hour, say.” Entenari spread her arms wide, then brought them together, and the stars shrunk down significantly, coalescing into the arm of a galaxy. “But we shall see. Highlight Delta Copernica and … what was the other planet?”

“Tarkis,” Beauceron and Rath said, at the same time.

The professor flashed Rath an inquiring look. “… and highlight Tarkis.” On the spiral arm, two blinking dots appeared. Entenari placed a finger on each holographic dot, and then pulled her hands apart, zooming in their field of view. “Draw me a hypothetical circle around each of the highlighted planets. Maximum travel distance for a conventional spacecraft. Tarkis at seven days, Delta Copernica at eleven.”

Two spheres appeared, with the blinking planets at their centers.

“Contrasting colors,” Entenari ordered. One sphere turned red, while the other turned blue. “So, our spheres overlap here, in this purple area. In the two dimensional plane, that geometrical shape is known as a vesica piscis. Your planet is somewhere in that overlap.”

“That was my suspicion,” Beauceron said.

Entenari sat back down at her desk, and typed on a keyboard next to her datascroll. “But I’m afraid that region contains … eighty-seven known planets.”

“Are any of them habitable?” Rath asked.

“Was that stipulated in the riddle?” she replied, taking her glasses off.

Beauceron nodded.

“How did the riddle define habitable? Aleppo is technically habitable, with the right life support systems.”

“No.” Beauceron shook his head. “Breathable atmosphere.”

“I see. So capable of supporting human life unassisted? Oxygen-rich atmosphere, temperate climate …?”

“Yes,” said Beauceron.

She typed again. “No … no planets match that narrow definition of habitable. Not one.”

The room was silent for a few seconds, then Paisen stood up. “Thank you for your time, Professor. We won’t take up any more of it.”

Beauceron held up a hand. “Wait. What was the gravity like?”

Paisen shot him an icy glare.

“Normal gravity,” Rath said quietly.

“Gentlemen, we should go. Now.” Paisen crossed her arms.

But Beauceron turned back to Entenari. “Can you filter that list down to planets with Earth-like gravity, please?”

“Of course. That gives us fourteen.”

“That’s still not your answer,” Paisen pointed out. “The riddle says there’s only one planet.”

“I know,” Beauceron said. “And if they altered the data on the planet being habitable, they could have altered the planet’s gravity data just as easily.”

Paisen frowned at him. Entenari looked from Paisen to Beauceron, a bemused smile on her face. “Apparently this ‘riddle’ is more nuanced than you initially assumed.”

An awkward silence fell over the room.

Rath looked at Entenari. When he spoke, his voice was quiet. “What if we had a picture of the constellations, as seen from that planet’s surface?”

The astronomer peered at him for a second. “Yes, that would work. The computer can match constellations to star charts.”

Paisen sighed. “How does that help us? I don’t remember the passengers in the riddle having cameras when they landed.”

“Just … bear with me,” Rath told her. He turned to Entenari. “Do you have something I can draw on?”

She handed him her datascroll. “A rough sketch won’t work, the software will be looking at the star’s relative positions, distances and angles from each other. A rough sketch won’t be accurate enough—”

But Rath had closed his eyes, recalling.

“Candidate 621, your rest cycle begins now.”

And I would lay back on the sand, and shiver, and look up at the stars.

Rath put his finger on the datascroll’s screen, and started adding stars. A light finger tap for a small one, a heavier tap for a large one. He worked for several minutes, until the screen was nearly full. When he was finished, Entenari took the datascroll back without a word, saved the sketch, and then uploaded it.

“It’s searching now,” she told them. The device beeped almost at once. She looked at Rath for a second, studying him. “You have a gift, my friend. Ninety-seven percent accuracy.”

“What planet?” Rath asked.

“Fusoria,” she replied. “That’s Ancient Latin for ‘crucible,’ or ‘foundry.’ ”

Beauceron and Paisen traded looks. “What do the survey records tell us about it?” the detective asked.

Entenari skimmed the text on her screen. “A nasty place. It has a very odd orbit, huge temperature extremes. Its atmospheric composition is atrocious, mostly methane. The unmanned exploration report says it also has high radiation levels, above average rates of seismic activity … not a good real estate investment. Its possibly one of the least habitable places I’ve heard of.”

Beauceron cocked an eyebrow at her. “Almost unbelievably so?”

“Unbelievable? No. It’s certainly possible. But it’s a bit unlikely, perhaps.”

Beauceron turned to Paisen. “If I were hacking into the exploratory records, and I wanted to edit a planet’s description to discourage anyone from ever visiting … I might write a description like that.”

Rath rubbed at his chin. “He has a point.”

Paisen sighed. “Fusoria?”

Entenari nodded, then sat back in her chair, smiling. “It looks like you’ll get your inheritance after all.”

6

At one end of the hangar bay, a small fleet of automated hoversleds worked to unload a container ship, while nearby, a team of mechanics used robotic arms to weld a new deck plate into place on the hull of a massive passenger liner. Paisen stepped around a refueling hose and jerked her head toward the far end of the bay.

“This way,” she said.

Rath craned his neck to look. “The grey one? The light freighter?”

She shook her head. “The yellow one next to it.”

Rath frowned. “What the hell is that?”

“A long-range surveyor ship,” she told him. “You think you can find another ship around here that has launch, reentry, and atmospheric flight capabilities, by all means, go find one.”

The ship was squat and wedge-shaped, with a rounded nose that flared back into a pair of wings and a set of four engines mounted over a cargo bay near the tail. It was painted bright yellow, with orange markings on the wings.

“It’s just … noticeable,” Beauceron said. “Hard to miss.”

Paisen ignored him. The ship’s rear ramp was down, allowing them to climb up into a roomy cargo hold. Paisen keyed a door release at the front of the hold, and they passed through into a corridor running down the spine of the ship.

“Cockpit up front, dead ahead,” Paisen said, pointing. “Crew quarters on either side of the passageway. Port side has the lounge and the kitchen, sleeping quarters on the starboard side. Captain has his own cabin just off the cockpit.”

“Where’s the captain?” Beauceron asked.

“Filing our flight plan,” she said. “Which has us going somewhere in the Territories, I don’t remember what he put down.”

She opened the door on the right, and selected a top bunk near the door, setting her Forge down at the foot of the bed. Beauceron and Rath claimed their own bunks.

“How much did this cost?” Rath asked.

“A hundred thousand a week,” Paisen said, shaking her head. “And we might get fuel surcharges if prices go up.”

Rath whistled. “Ouch.”

“Yeah. Fusoria is an eight-day journey from here, so we’re going to burn most of our funds just getting there and back.”

Rath palmed the door switch, and it slid shut. “What do you know about the pilot?” he asked, voice low.

She shrugged. “He has the ship we need, and he didn’t ask any questions.”

“What did you tell him?” Beauceron asked.

“Enough,” Paisen said. “He knows we’re likely to see some action.” She tapped a fist against the ship’s bulkhead. “This thing is armed. Lightly armed, but enough for our purposes.”

“Did you get the sense we can trust him?” Rath asked.

She laughed. “Trust? What’s that? Look, he gouged me on the price, but I got the sense this isn’t the first time he’s done this kind of thing. He took the money up-front, and didn’t want to know our destination until after we take off.”

There was a discreet knock at the door.

“Come in,” Paisen called.

The door opened, and the captain entered. He was a slight man, with an impressive head of dreadlocks tied back in a copper band. His dark, freckled skin was somewhat pallid from long hours spent traveling through space, but he was meticulously groomed. He wore a set of pressed coveralls and a silk cravat at his neck, which looked strangely out of place against the rough cloth of his uniform coveralls. He glanced at Rath and Beauceron.

“Gentlemen, welcome aboard the Hurasu. I’m Captain Mikolos.” He caught sight of a smudge on the polished desktop next to the door, and wiped it away with a micro-fiber cloth from his pocket. “We’re, ah, ready to leave whenever you are,” he told Paisen.

“Then let’s get going.”

* * *

In the Hurasu’s lounge, Paisen fiddled with the holographic projector in the center of the lounge’s table. It flipped on and displayed a boot-up logo.

“You think the survey maps of Fusoria are going to be accurate?” Beauceron asked, nodding at the hologram.

“No,” Paisen said. “But I always plan better when I’m looking at a map.” A blank planet appeared in the projector, spinning slowly. “Okay, we’ve got a little over seven days before we exit faster-than-light. Let’s put them to good use.”

Rath sat down at the table. “Enemy situation?”

“Yeah,” Paisen agreed. “Let’s start with what we know. Long range transports bring in recruits – and presumably supplies, and new medical personnel from time to time – but they dock directly to shuttles in orbit. On the surface, there are Group facilities in at least two different locations: the island itself, and the medical facility out at sea.”

“If you docked directly to the shuttle when you arrived, that means there’s no orbital transfer station?” Beauceron asked.

“Right,” Rath said. “Probably too expensive to build and maintain.”

“That’s a reasonable assumption,” Paisen agreed. “If there is a transfer station, it would likely have a complement of fighters or long-range anti-ship missiles. Or both. Either way, we wouldn’t stand a chance.”

“We’d have to bug out, and make a new plan based on what we see of their defenses,” Rath said.

Paisen cocked her head to one side. “Or let them board us, then overwhelm the boarding team.”

Beauceron shook his head. “I’m not sure I’ll be doing any ‘overwhelming.’ That could quickly turn to bloodshed.”

Paisen sighed. “Beauceron, we may not have a choice.”

“There’s always a choice. We can leave, call Interstellar Police, and notify them where to find the planet.”

“… and hope we didn’t call a dirty cop, and hope the Group doesn’t find us and kill us before the IP get their act together to come investigate the planet. I don’t think so. I’m not a big fan of basing my plans on hope.”

“I don’t think you hope much, period,” Beauceron pointed out.

Paisen ignored him. “We’ve covered the most dangerous enemy scenario - heavily defended orbital transfer station. Now let’s talk most likely scenario. My money is on deep space drones in high orbit, and some fixed weapons emplacements on the island and the training facility, in case anyone gets through the high orbit screen. The weapon emplacements are easy … once we take out the drones and establish aerospace superiority, we can locate the weapons emplacements from orbit and pick them off with PKDs before approaching. But the space drones will maneuver into a defensive posture as soon as they pick us up on sensors, and they’ll be much harder to defeat. I’m thinking counter-drones are our best bet, with the Hurasu’s guns for mop-up.”

“What are ‘PKDs’?” Beauceron asked, looking at Rath.

Rath shrugged. “Yeah, what are counter-drones? Where did you learn this stuff?”

“What, orbital assaults?”

“Yeah. I’ve never heard of PKDs, I don’t know any of this.”

“It was in one of the later training modules … I don’t remember, sometime in the second year of training.”

“Wait, what? You had two years of training?”

“Nearly,” Paisen confirmed. “About twenty-two months. You didn’t?”

“No,” Rath said. “I finished in under a year.”

“Perhaps they changed the curriculum before you went through, Rath,” Beauceron suggested. “To get you out into the field faster.”

“Yeah, with less preparation,” Rath noted.

“Can we get back on track?” Paisen asked. “‘PKD’ stands for Precision Kinetic Dart – it’s a guided munition that we drop from high altitude.”

“A bomb?” Beauceron asked.

“No, there’s no chemical energy component, it’s just an inert metal rod. But by the time it reaches the surface, it’s going so fast that it’s nearly impossible for static targets to defend against. We can build a dozen or so with our Forges, they don’t have to be big.”

“Collateral damage?” Rath asked.

“Minimal. There’s shrapnel from the impact, so if you’re standing right next to where it impacts, you’re going to have a bad day. But otherwise it just punches a neat, surgical hole right through any defenses we target. That’s why the emplacements are easy. It’s the space drones that I’m worried about. We’re going to use up a lot of our Forge canister reserves to build counter-drones, and we need to start building them now to allow enough time.”

“Okay,” Rath agreed. “Assuming we get through the drones and take out the anti-air weapons on the ground, what next?”

“They’ll have us on sensors as soon as we come out of faster-than-light drive, so we’ll have lost the element of surprise. Things will be a bit fluid from that point on. I think we keep pressure on them, and assault one of the facilities while momentum is in our favor.”

“The only facilities we know of are on the island, where candidates are tested, and the platform out at sea, where surgery and training happens, right?” Beauceron asked.

Paisen turned to Rath. “You’re the one with the photographic memory – did you see anything else while you were there?”

Rath frowned. “No. All I saw on the island was my drone. No other people, not even the other trainees. There could be structures underground, but … I doubt it. I agree that the platform is our best bet. Plus, that’s where we think most of the Group employees are, and we’ll need to secure them, fast.”

“True,” Paisen said. “We don’t want them mounting a counter-attack while we search the island.” She tapped at a control screen mounted in the table top, and the hologram of the planet disappeared, replaced with a three dimensional rendering of the platform. “The training center is actually a converted deep sea drilling rig. I did some research several months back and obtained the structural plans for that model. It wasn’t easy – this thing is a real dinosaur, it even runs on an old fission reactor. I started labeling areas based on my recollection, but … it was a long time ago.”

Rath walked slowly around the table, examining the hologram. “It’s … different. That’s not quite right.”

“They may have modified the platform from its original configuration,” Paisen admitted.

“Is this manipulable?” Rath asked.

“Go for it.”

Rath swiped several elements off the screen, and enlarged a section of the super-structure. “This whole platform was built up … it looked like an outdoor recreation area for staff, or something along those lines. On the air car flight in, I saw autonomous weapons emplacements … here, here, here, and here. And this looked like an interstellar communications node.”

Paisen reached into the model and added icons where Rath had indicated. “You might not know orbital assault, but that head of yours is a handy thing to have around,” she told him.

Beauceron shifted in his seat. “How many people are stationed on the platform?”

Paisen shrugged. “Eighty to a hundred, by my estimates. A small guard force, probably with their own air car – call it ten. Another ten miscellaneous support staff: clerks, cleaning crew, cooks. Medical teams are about twenty personnel, assuming two full surgical teams on standby, in case multiple recruits complete Selection at the same time. And then some techs and supervisors to monitor and direct the drones during Selection. That’s the biggest unknown – we don’t know how many contractors are on the island at any one time, so trying to figure out how many techs would be needed to monitor their progress is iffy. But I don’t think the platform is big enough to house more than a hundred people, and even that would be pretty tight.”

Beauceron scratched at his head, where stubble was beginning to grow back in. “How are the three of us meant to keep control of a hundred people?”

“The guard force should be manageable, if they’re anything like the Group teams Paisen and I have faced in the past,” Rath said. “But if they have weapons for the rest of the permanent staff, we’re in trouble. Forty or fifty armed defenders, even amateur ones, is … daunting.”

“True,” Paisen agreed. “We need a plan to subdue the entire population in short order, and it can’t be going room-to-room, breaching and clearing.”

“And we’re forgetting one other group,” Rath pointed out. “Contractors. There will probably be several contractors in Training on the platform, and any number of candidates going through Selection on the island. Should we try to recruit them, and the ones on the island, too?”

Paisen shook her head. “No. They’re a wild card – too unpredictable, and probably still loyal to the Group.”

“So how do we control the people at the facility?” Beauceron repeated.

“The Hurasu has missiles,” Paisen suggested. “We could hit one of the living areas on the platform to demonstrate we’re serious. Then we can order them all up onto the top deck, and interrogate them while the ship provides overwatch.”

Beauceron shook his head vehemently. “No. I won’t be party to murdering innocent people.”

Paisen sighed. “No one on that planet is innocent.”

“Only a jury can decide that,” Beauceron shot back.

Paisen pretended to look around the cabin. “Well, in the absence of a suitable jury ….”

“No,” Beauceron said. “We have to find a way to do it without bloodshed.”

“What do you want to do, run around stun-gunning a hundred people? They’re not going to play fair, you know. If they don’t blast us out of the sky before we even get to the rig, they’ll gun us down in cold blood the minute we set down. With real bullets. Bloodshed is justified here, considering—”

Rath interrupted her: “Listen, Martin has a point. We don’t know who’s on that platform. If we go for a missile strike, we could kill the only people who can get us our money, right?”

Paisen crossed her arms, her mouth set in a thin line.

Rath turned to Beauceron “But we can’t control all of those people if we don’t put them under direct threat. We might not carry through on that threat, but they won’t know that … we just have to show them we can harm them if we choose to, right? Right?”

Beauceron grunted in reluctant agreement, but Paisen stayed silent. Rath decided to interpret her silence as agreement.

“Okay,” Rath said. “So how do we threaten them?”

* * *

On the counter at the edge of the cabin, both Rath and Paisen’s Forges were busy building components for another set of counter-drones. Below them, stacked along the floor, were a row of completed autonomous vehicles, ready for action. Paisen waited until Rath’s Forge completed a rocket motor, and then attached it to a half-finished counter-drone body. Rath’s Forge started on another engine, while she walked back to the lounge’s table and sat down to finish her meal.

“Are we on track?” Rath asked.

“I don’t know,” she said, scooping a bite of stew off her plate. “I think we’re going to be short a few. We’re less than twenty-four hours out, so we need to switch to PKDs and personal weapons soon.”

She took another bite, and then noticed Rath playing with a small necklace, passing the multi-colored beads through the fingers of one hand while he ate.

“What’s that?” she asked.

Rath glanced at it, then slid it into his pocket self-consciously. “Nothing,” he said.

“You carry around jewelry all the time?” Paisen asked, cocking an eyebrow at him. “Come on, what is it?”

“It’s nothing,” Rath insisted.

Beauceron smiled. “It’s for a woman,” he told Paisen. “Rath met her some time ago, but he didn’t get the chance to give it to her. He’s hoping to do so when all of this is over.”

“The one that got away, huh?” Paisen joked.

“Something like that,” Rath said.

After dinner, they assembled the final counter-drones. Paisen decided to take the first shift watching the Forges, staying in the lounge to assemble components as they were completed. Beauceron and Rath headed to their bunks to try to get some rest.

Rath dreamed about Jaymy. He was back in orbit above Scapa, and after fighting his way off the Suspensys station, he rendezvoused with his spaceship, riding the suspension pod through space just as he had done in real life. In the ship’s cargo bay, he saw the planet slide into view, and so he pushed the suspension pod out of the ship, sending it off to burn up in Scapa’s atmosphere. But as it slid away from him, it twisted, and instead of his target, he saw Jaymy inside. She was awake, and terrified, banging on the clear viewing window, shrieking in terror. Rath launched himself after her, but he could not reach her, and he watched as the pod’s hull glowed a dull orange, then turned white hot. He woke sobbing, grasping at the thin blanket covering him.

Paisen stood in the doorway watching him, and across the room, Beauceron was sitting up in his bunk.

“You cried out again,” Beauceron said gently. “Another bad dream?”

Rath nodded. “I can’t … I don’t know how to stop them.”

“You get nightmares every night,” Paisen pointed out, “yet I’m the one who was tortured. What’s wrong with this picture?”

Rath collapsed back onto his pillow, rubbing his forehead. “I don’t know. With my memory, my mind just keeps replaying things, over and over. And my dreams have always felt so real.”

“You haven’t slept more than a few hours each night since we left New Liberia. Is it always like this?” Beauceron asked.

“Yes.”

“With the cash we take from the Group, you could look into a memory wipe,” Paisen suggested.

“Yeah,” Rath said. “That was the plan. But I promised Martin he could arrest me, so that he would help me find you.”

“And you’ll need your memory intact to testify against the Group,” Beauceron told him.

“I know,” Rath said. “Just remember you said you would try to find a way to get my memory erased after the trial.”

Beauceron shrugged. “I will try, but … it’s an illegal operation.”

Paisen shook her head. “Well, considering you never sleep, you’re in luck: it’s your turn to man the Forges,” Paisen said.

Rath swung his legs out of the bunk. “Are the PKDs done?”

“Yeah. And primary weapons. You’re up to sidearms and grenades, then my infiltration gear.”

“Okay,” he yawned. “See you in a few hours.”

He palmed the door open to find Mikolos standing there, about to enter.

“Ah, you’re all up? Good,” he noted. “Offensive systems checks are complete. We exit FTL in eighteen hours.”

7

Professor Entenari tapped her bracelet against her apartment door and the lock illuminated in response, changing gradually from red to green. She pushed her way inside, shutting the door behind her, before turning to stow her overcoat in the front hall closet. As she slid the closet door closed, she felt a puff of air on the back of her neck.

“Don’t make a sound,” the man whispered.

She froze.

“Living room,” he ordered.

Shaking, she took a seat on the couch, and only then did she look at her attacker. He stood in the center of the living room, looking down at her. He wore a thin cloth mask over his face, but at the base of his neck, she saw bright pink welts that indicated a recent, nasty burn. A matte-black handgun was gripped in his right hand.

“What do you want?” she asked.

“To talk,” he told her.

He held up a datascroll with his free hand, and she saw a video on the screen. She recognized it as footage taken from a security camera in the university’s lobby. Two men and a woman were standing by the reception desk; they appeared to talk for a short time, and then walked out of the frame.

“Do you recognize them?”

She nodded silently.

“They visited your classroom. What did they want?”

“They wanted my help. The short man’s father had died recently, and left him a riddle to solve.”

“And did you solve it?”

“Yes.” Her cat padded softly into the living room, and seeing Entenari seated on the couch, leapt up next to her. The cat was a Persian: tan, with black, tufted ears and bright green eyes. He meowed at Entenari, but she kept her eyes on the intruder.

“What was the answer to the riddle?” he asked.

“A planet called Fusoria.”

Undeterred, the cat hopped down from the couch and rubbed himself against the man’s leg, purring. He watched it in silence until it grew bored, and left. Then he raised the pistol, drawing a bead on Entenari’s forehead.

“I’m telling the truth,” she said.

“I know.”

She took a deep breath, and forced her gaze away from the barrel of the pistol, up into his cold eyes. “You can kill me now, and then spend valuable time cleaning up, and filing your report, or whatever it is you do next. And perhaps, everything I know will die with me.”

He flipped the safety off.

“… but what I know may not die with me. I may have left Fusoria’s location with a trusted friend, with instructions to publicize it should I die unexpectedly.”

She held her breath, but the man’s finger stayed on the gun’s trigger guard.

“So … you could leave, and trust that I have no interest whatsoever in sharing what I know,” she continued, fighting to keep the nerves from her voice. “Those people left my office just after six p.m. yesterday evening. They would have needed to find and charter a private spacecraft for the trip to Fusoria. That takes time. That means they have, at most, about a fifteen hour head start on you. If you left right now, you could arrive soon after they did.”

She glanced at the pistol.

“And if you’re lucky, and your ship is fast … you may even arrive at the same time.”

8

The commotion woke Dasi early. She dressed quickly and stuck her head out of her door, to find a large group of medical personnel gathered by the elevators, all carrying luggage. Curious, she followed them, but the elevator doors closed before she got there. Then two more nurses joined her, wheeling bags behind them, and pressed the call button. She knew better than to ask them what was going on, so she merely smiled at them. They smiled politely back.

“I cannot wait to get a good meal,” one observed, as the elevator doors opened again.

“Oh god, I know. I’m just looking forward to going out for drinks!”

The women boarded, and Dasi followed. A minute later they emerged on the upper deck. Dasi walked outside and leaned against the metal bulkhead to watch. Several doctors were loading their bags onto the air car: they climbed in, and the air car lifted off, heading for the island. Dasi watched for nearly an hour as the air car shuttled all of the medical personnel to the island, and soon after, caught a glimpse of the shuttle descending through the clouds over the island. Her stomach grumbled, and she realized breakfast was nearly over – she hurried back down into the facility.

She was late starting her chores, but no one ever seemed to mind when she did them – in fact, she had a strong suspicion that Bekka had deactivated several cleaning drones just to give her a job to do. But the stern woman was right: as crazy as it sounded, she found she looked forward to her cleaning routine each morning. She was mopping the corridor in the living quarters when the elevators opened and a group of doctors Dasi didn’t recognize walked out, following Bekka.

“You’ll find your dorm rooms on this level,” Bekka told them. She gave Dasi a tight smile. “Please leave your luggage in your assigned room, and we’ll continue your orientation down in the cafeteria.”

They disappeared a minute later, and Dasi continued mopping the hall. Then she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned.

“Charl! You got my message!” she cried.

She was so relieved to see a familiar face, she found herself hugging the senator without thinking.

This man had Khyron killed.

She stepped back, but found herself still wrapped in his arms.

“I came as soon as I could,” he told her.

He leaned forward as if to kiss her, but she shrank away.

“Sorry,” he apologized. “I just … seeing you again, I thought I had put those emotions behind me, and moved on, but ….”

“It’s okay,” she said, extracting herself politely from his arms. “It’s just been a long few weeks. Can we go somewhere private?” Dasi asked.

“Of course.” He leaned forward, embracing her again. Dasi held her hands up protectively, but then she heard his voice whispering in her ear. “Nothing’s private here – everything is being recorded.”

Dasi felt a shiver of fear.

He’s scared of them.

Her stomach dropped with the realization, but when he let go, she led him into her room, and took a seat on the bed. Lizelle sat on the easy chair.

“So they have you mopping floors?” he asked, smiling weakly. “Not exactly what you had in mind as a resume builder after running PR for a major political campaign.”

“It’s fine,” she told him. “I don’t care about that. It’s just … I need to know what’s going to happen to me, you know?” She pulled her knees up, hugging them to her chest. “I know I learned some things I shouldn’t have … but I still have no idea what it all means. And I know not to try to figure anything else out while I’m here.”

“Good,” Lizelle agreed. “Ignorance is your best defense.”

“But Charl, it feels like I’ve been sentenced to life without parole, and I can’t … I need to know there’s an end in sight. I’d like to talk to somebody about when I can leave. So I thought you might know. Or at least, you might be able to help.”

Lizelle cleared his throat, and Dasi watched as he struggled to find the right words. “It’s a tricky situation, Dasi. And my hands are a bit tied … I took a big risk just to get you here, to save your life. I don’t have much capital left to use, if that makes sense.”

Dasi’s face fell.

“What if I was able to visit you more often, to give you someone to talk to?”

“Why would you do that?” she asked, frowning.

“Because I like seeing you … because I love you, Dasi.”

Embarrassed, she looked away. “That night was a mistake. I love – loved – Khyron, and then I betrayed his trust with you, and I never came clean with him. And I can’t forgive myself. And every time I see you, it’s like someone’s holding up a mirror and forcing me to see all the terrible things I’ve done.”

“You’re not a monster, Dasi. Human nature is a funny thing. And you can’t blame yourself for his death.”

“I don’t!” she snapped, eyes flashing with anger.

Lizelle’s face fell. “Ah. Then you blame me?”

“I … I don’t know what to think. I’m sorry I misled you with that hug. You have to understand, no one even talks to me here, they’re not allowed to. It’s like being in solitary confinement, except you’re forced to watch everyone interacting normally around you all the time. I feel like a ghost. So, when I saw someone I knew for the first time, it was … anyway, I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize to me, ever. I, on the other hand, will probably be apologizing to you for the rest of our lives.”

“If you’re so sorry, then … get me out of here,” she suggested.

He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “Dasi, without revealing too much, my influence is severely constrained in this case. I’m a powerful man, but this … organization … has other people that oversee it, not just me. And by giving Khyron access to the Senate databases, I unwittingly exposed the whole operation, or nearly so, which is the most serious offense one can commit. And two people died for it. You were very nearly the third.”

“Two people?”

“Mm-hm. Khyron and the attorney you spoke to … I forget his name.”

“They killed him, too?”

“Actually, I bribed him, and I was willing to leave it at that. But dead men tell no tales … I was overruled, and he paid the ultimate price for his involvement as well.”

Dasi studied the floor for a time. When she spoke, her voice was barely a whisper. “Am I ever going to get off this planet?”

“Yes,” he told her, but Dasi could detect little conviction in his tone. “It just takes time. Let me work on my colleagues, and with time, I’m sure they will see reason. I’ll get you out of here, I promise. But you have to help me, too – no more escapes.”

“Okay,” she agreed.

The dial on his watch flashed impatiently. Lizelle checked it, and swore. “It seems my air car is ready for me.” He stood up. “I wanted to stay for longer, but they have a schedule to maintain.” He shrugged in apology.

Dasi stood, too, and wiped the tears from her eyes. “And I’m sure you need to get back to the real world. Are you heading back to Anchorpoint?”

“No – we’re not in session right now.”

“Right.” Dasi smiled wanly. “I forgot the schedule. I can’t even remember what day of the week it is.”

“Tuesday.” He grinned. “I think it’s Tuesday, at least. I’m headed home for a couple weeks of fundraising. Will you see me off?”

She walked him up to the landing pad, where a security guard stood next to the idling air car. Lizelle stopped and put a hand on her shoulder.

“It was good to see you, Dasi.”

“Thanks for coming.”

“I had to make sure you weren’t drifting around the ocean in a life raft,” he told her, smiling sadly.

She made herself smile back. “Will you ask them?”

“I will, I promise. And either way, I’ll be back in six months, at most. Hang in there for me.”

“Sir,” the guard said.

“Yes, coming.” He turned to leave.

“Don’t forget about me,” she called after him.

“Never,” he promised, and then took his seat in the air car. The guard shut the door and Dasi watched as it rose into the sky, heading back to the island, and the waiting shuttle.

9

Through the canopy, the inky black flickered once, twice, and with a final rippling shimmer, the Hurasu exited faster-than-light. Fusoria appeared before them, a blue-grey sphere, mottled with red. Captain Mikolos corrected their course, and then checked his sensors.

“Nothing in orbit. Nothing big, at least.”

“So far, so good,” Paisen noted. A moment later, a number of black dots appeared against the backdrop of the planet, coalescing into a group.

“There are the drones.” She zoomed in on the ship’s forward-looking camera. “They look like Sapient-class orbiters, about thirty of them.”

“We’re being hailed,” Beauceron reported from the rear seats, where he sat wearing a radio headset.

“Send them the distress message,” Paisen told him. Beauceron hit a button on the console next to him.

“Drones are headed this way,” Rath commented.

“Keep heading in,” Paisen told Mikolos. She checked their distance to the drones, then reached over and flipped a switch on the control panel. After a split-second delay, a cluster of counter-drones streaked past the canopy, forming into a tight wedge ahead of the ship.

“Sapient drones are forming up,” Rath said. “Looks like a small box formation in the lead, with the majority behind that in a reserve holding pattern.”

“Okay, be ready on mop-up.”

Rath took hold of the Hurasu’s nose cannon controls, flipping the safety cover off the trigger. In the vacuum ahead, lines of tracer fire extended out from the enemy drones. “Sapients are firing at our counter-drones.”

Through her neural interface, Paisen sent the micro-drones a signal. Explosive charges split each of them into eight separate drones, each just a miniaturized rocket motor with a guidance package. The micro-drones dispersed in a seemingly random fashion, blooming outwards and spreading around the Sapient drones in the lead formation. Then each lit their rocket. With a sudden burst of speed, they converged simultaneously inwards on the larger set of drones in reserve. A series of flashes appeared as the micro-drones found their targets.

“Hit the lead formation, Rath.”

“On it.”

They didn’t hear the cannon firing, but instead felt the ship vibrate as the slugs poured forward. On Rath’s targeting screen, he saw a number of Sapient drones torn apart, but the sudden debris field obscured the rest of the formation.

“Seven still active,” Paisen noted. “They’re coming at us.”

“I’m trying … it’s hard to pick them out against all the background noise.” Rath sent another burst into the formation.

“Four more, closing fast.”

Mikolos glanced sideways at Rath. “Do not let them hit my ship.”

“Two more,” Paisen said. “Okay, got him, get the last—”

Crunch. Pieces of shattered drone rattled against the canopy, scratching it in several spots.

“God damn it,” Mikolos swore.

“Anything critical?” Paisen asked.

Mikolos flipped through several screens at his station. “… no, just some hull damage.”

“Bad? Can we still withstand atmospheric entry?”

“Yes – this craft was built to fly through a meteor shower, we’re fine. But the repair is not going to be cheap.”

“I’m good for it,” Paisen assured him. “Did sensors pick up the platform yet?”

“Yes, it’s …,” Mikolos peered out the canopy, then pointed. “There. On the night side.”

“Good,” Paisen said. “I always preferred night drops. Beauceron, radio report?”

“They stopped hailing us. But sensors are picking up a lot of interstellar traffic.”

“Calling for help,” Rath guessed.

“Well, let’s pay them a visit,” Paisen said. “Captain, if you’ll take us in, I’m going to go suit up. Rath, kick the precision darts out at about sixty thousand feet, that’s their optimal altitude.”

“I know, we will. Go!”

She slipped out of the flight deck, and the door slid shut behind her. Mikolos ran several approach scenarios on his navigation computer, flying wide to avoid the swirling debris from the drone battle. Then he took them in on an aggressive entry envelope, checking the hull diagnostics obsessively as they passed through the upper atmosphere.

“Are we okay?” Rath asked, watching the hull outside the window begin to glow.

“Yes,” Mikolos confirmed. “Temperatures are a little higher than normal, but hull integrity is fine.” He tapped the altimeter meaningfully.

“Eighty-thousand feet, Paisen,” Rath radioed.

“Roger. Level off and open the bay doors,” she replied. “Okay, gentlemen. See you on the surface.”

* * *

Paisen gave her equipment a final visual check, and then stepped off the Hurasu’s rear ramp into the pitch-black night. After a second of tumbling in free-fall, she steadied herself, spreading her arms and legs to better control her descent. Below her, she saw nothing but dark, and even switching to infrared on her visual feed revealed nothing.

Cloud cover. Let’s hope the ceiling isn’t too low over the drop zone.

As she fell, she watched her altitude on her heads-up display. At twenty-three thousand feet, a packet of glowing orange objects ripped past her, hurtling down toward the surface.

There go the kinetic darts.

She passed through a thick layer of clouds seconds later, and when she emerged, the platform revealed itself directly below her, its lights reflecting off the rippling waves. She spotted the darts again, and watched as they homed in on their targets.

Knock, knock …

* * *

Dasi couldn’t sleep. After nearly an hour of tossing and turning in her bunk, she gave up and slipped into a bathrobe and a pair of shoes, quietly let herself out of her room, and then made her way down the hall to the external hatch. The night was cool, and for a second, she considered going back to her room for something warmer, but decided against it. Instead she wrapped the robe tighter around herself and took the metal stairs two at a time until she reached the main deck of the platform.

The sky was cloudy – she could see no stars. She walked past the landing platform and across to the recreation area. The lifeboat that she had stolen, she noted, was back hanging from its winches again. A middle-aged woman was seated at one of the benches along the platform edge, so Dasi hesitated, and then walked closer. She cleared her throat to get the woman’s attention.

The woman turned, surprised, but smiled and shifted over on the bench. “Come join me. As long as you don’t mind me vaping.” She held up a mini-vape, whose tip glowed pink in the night.

Dasi shook her head. “No. But I’m … we’re not supposed to talk.” She sat down and wrapped her arms around her chest.

“Oh, that’s you, huh? Well, whatever,” the woman shrugged. “I don’t see any guards.” She took a long pull on her mini-vape. “I come up here most nights, and it seems like every time I need to add another layer of clothing. I guess we’re headed into the winter season.”

“Maybe,” Dasi agreed.

“Really makes you feel for those kids out there on the island,” the woman noted.

Suddenly, a powerful siren sounded from the platform’s tower. The two women stood up in alarm. Dasi heard the platform’s PA system click on, static humming from the speakers mounted around the platform.

All this just for talking to somebody?!

“Security personnel to alert status,” a voice announced.

“What’s going on?” the woman asked.

“I don’t know,” Dasi said. “Did they tell you what to do if the alarms go off?”

“No, at Orientation they just covered fire drills and evacuation procedures – lifeboats and stuff.” The woman turned off her vaporizer and tucked it into a pocket on the front of her sweatshirt. “Maybe we should—”

“All personnel proceed immediately to the cafeteria,” the voice ordered. “This is not a drill.”

Dasi and the woman shared a troubled look, and started back through the recreation area. They were halfway across when a high-pitched shriek split the night, and the noise of the sirens was momentarily drowned out by a series of deafening crashes. The platform trembled and Dasi lost her footing, falling forward with a cry of alarm. From her knees, she looked up to see fire pouring out of the platform’s communications tower. To her right, some kind of turret was also burning, and as she watched, its metal base groaned, and the entire structure toppled off the side of the platform, crashing into the waves far below.

“The stairs!” the woman was at Dasi’s elbow, hauling her to her feet. “Come on, we’ve gotta get to the edge of the platform! We’ll take the emergency stairs down.”

They ran, and then scrambled down the narrow staircase.

“The cafeteria’s on Level Two,” Dasi told the woman.

“What level are we on now?” she asked, out of breath.

Dasi looked around, searching for a marker. “Umm … I don’t know.”

She glanced upwards, and over the ocean, noticed something falling. It zipped past her level, but as Dasi watched, a complex geometrical shape expanded out of it, like a flower blooming. The odd shape jerked the object to a halt in mid-air. Then, just as quickly, the shape seemed to dissolve, and the object below it dropped into the water below.

“Did you see that?” Dasi asked.

“What?”

“There, below us – there was a person, with a parachute, I think. But it’s gone.”

“Better tell a guard when we get to the cafeteria,” the woman noted.

They found the cafeteria nearly full when they hurried in, less than a minute later. Dasi looked for a security guard, but she failed to see one. She did spot Bekka talking with several other senior staffers in one corner of the room, but as she walked over, they appeared to reach a decision, and one of the men raised his hand.

“Everyone please take a seat and stop talking,” he shouted.

One of his colleagues intercepted Dasi a second later.

“Please take a seat,” he told her firmly.

Dasi frowned.

Fine, I will.

* * *

Siya Nkosi finished her glass of champagne and a waiter appeared immediately to offer her a fresh flute, the bubbles streaming from a fresh strawberry suspended in the golden liquid. She took the glass, and then surveyed the scene from her patio. In the lower gardens amongst the fountains, a group of guests sat on lounge chairs under sun canopies, listening to a trio composed of an electric harp, an old-style grand piano, and a vocalist. Closer to her mansion, the rest of the party-goers were enjoying the buffet, which was artfully laid out on white silk-covered tables nestled amongst the statues and topiaries of the upper garden. She decided she was not hungry, and started down the marble stairs toward the concert. Her senior butler intercepted her at the bottom, datascroll in hand.

“My apologies, madam, but there’s an urgent matter requiring your attention.”

Nkosi frowned, but took the datascroll he held out to her and activated it with her thumbprint. She scanned the text of the message briefly, her eyes narrowing, but she controlled herself quickly, and gave the butler a tight smile when she finished.

“Thank you. I’ll take the call in my office.”

“Of course.”

She considered removing her high heels to be able to walk faster, but decided immediately against it. Instead, she forced herself to walk calmly back up the stairs, and deliberately made her way across the patio. By the time she was back inside the house, her hemobots had neutralized all of the alcohol in her system, eliminating the mild buzz she had been enjoying. As she rounded the corner into the foyer, her brother grabbed her by the arm.

“Siya,” he said.

“Let go, Efrim,” she told him impatiently.

“Great party, little sister,” he slurred.

She scowled at him with distaste. “You’re drunk. Let go.”

“Where are you going? Are you bailing on your own party?”

“No, of course not. But I have urgent business to attend to.”

“Oh … sounds important.” He rolled his eyes.

“It’s important enough that you couldn’t be trusted with it.”

He looked hurt, but then gathered his wits enough to lash back at her. “You’re a little girl playing at a man’s game. The first and only girl in the family to get to run the family business,” he snorted. “Whatever. Just because you got to run the Guild and I didn’t, doesn’t mean you can push me around.”

She glanced quickly around. “Lower your voice,” she hissed. “Have some discretion, for once in your life.”

“Why did they choose you, anyway?” he asked, ignoring her reprimand. “What’s so special about you?”

“Discretion, dedication, and intelligence,” she told him. “For starters. But most of all, they recognized that I’m the only one left in this family with the balls to run the business effectively.”

She wrenched herself free from his grasp, and strode down the hall into her office, locking the door behind her.

“Open a secure line to Headquarters,” she commanded. The viewscreen on her wall came to life, and several seconds later, an encryption symbol appeared, closely followed by the face of her Chief of Operations.

“Fusoria?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” Feykin replied.

“Did you scramble the response team?”

“Yes,” he replied.

“What do we know so far?”

“A modified scout vessel exited faster-than-light travel close to the planet. They sent a distress signal – a diversion, nothing more. Then they neutralized our drone defense network with a fairly sophisticated attack, and entered the atmosphere. We lost contact with the facility soon afterwards.”

“What’s your assessment of the threat?”

“The ship is small – at most, it can carry a platoon-sized element. So we believe it’s a raid, and not a seize-and-hold operation. It’s certainly not Interstellar Police. There’s a chance we’re dealing with an ambitious competitor, looking to deal a blow to our supply chain … but the Crisis Team feels strongly that it’s our rogue contractors, and I have to agree with that estimate.”

“339 and 621?”

“And the detective from Alberon, assuming he’s still aiding them.”

“What’s their play?” Nkosi asked.

“Revenge,” Feykin suggested. “Or perhaps they hope to steal equipment or supplies, or hold our people ransom.”

Nkosi shook her head. “No. I’d believe revenge. More likely they’re simply searching for more information about the Group. And we can’t discount the possibility that they’re viewing this as a recruiting opportunity. How many candidates and trainees are on Fusoria right now?”

“No trainees – the last of them completed Training Phase last week and were flown off-world when we rotated the medical staff out. But there are eight candidates in Selection right now.”

“Where’s 700?” Nkosi asked, changing subjects.

Feykin frowned. “He was on Aleppo, tracking down that astronomer. But that was a while ago.” He checked his computer for several seconds. “Ah, I see what happened. He was on Aleppo during that IT stand-down, when we had the communications outage. He likely tried to report in, but we were rebooting the encryption servers. He hasn’t reported in since then … and it’s been nearly a week. It looks like he’s in transit somewhere.”

Nkosi raised an eyebrow. “Assuming the astronomer helped our rogue contractors locate Fusoria, he would have learned that, as well. He may be en route there now.”

* * *

Mikolos skimmed the Hurasu low over the waves, yanking back on the stick at the last second to pull them up several hundred feet. Rath checked his targeting computer, then let loose a string of cannon shells, which rained down on the air car parked on the platform’s landing pad. Mikolos banked hard and added power, turning away from the platform and dipping back down to the waves. A line of tracer fire followed them away.

“Those looked like small arms,” Rath noted. “All of the anti-air emplacements were on fire or destroyed, from what I could see.”

At his station, Beauceron panned the ship’s rear-facing camera over the platform as it receded from view. “Yes, the emplacements are out of commission. And Rath, you hit the air car, I don’t think it’s operational any more. But we’ve got at least one guard on the upper platform now.”

“Okay,” Rath said. “One more pass.”

They swept in from a different angle this time, and Rath walked his cannon fire carefully along the row of lifeboats lining the edge of the platform, ripping them apart. Rifle rounds clattered off the Hurasu’s hull as they sped away.

“That will have to do,” Rath said. “Too many guards on the platform to risk any more cannon fire.”

“Stay close?” Mikolos asked.

“Yeah. Do a couple more fly-bys – just keep making close passes until we get Paisen’s signal.”

* * *

Paisen hit the water hard, and let her momentum carry her well beneath the surface. As she slowed, she twisted onto her back, peering back up at the waves through her helmet. She could see no evidence of the parachute at the surface, which meant that it had disintegrated as programmed. She shrugged out of the empty harness, found her bearings, and swam over to the nearest pylon. The massive metal cylinder was crusted with marine growth, and in the murky dark it took several seconds to orient herself in relation to the platform.

Too shallow – and I need to move onto the inward side of the pylon.

She swam deeper, breathing from her suit’s integrated air supply, and then used her arms to pull herself the final few feet into position. From a pouch on her chest, she uncoiled a loop of det-cord, arranging it in a rough circle on the side of the pylon. Then she set the timer, and kicked hard for the surface, placing the bulk of the pylon between her and the explosives. She waited just below the waves for several seconds, and then felt a pressure wave whip through the water column.

Paisen descended again, and as she neared the pylon, she felt the pull of a current tugging her downwards. She paused, treading to stay in place, and watched as air bubbles boiled out of the circular hole she had blown in the hull. When they stopped, she flipped on her headlamp, and entered the hole.

Looks like I nailed the location.

A flooded hallway stretched away from Paisen on either side. Sealed hatches, each labeled with a letter and number, lined the hall. Paisen stood up, and found her head in a pocket of air trapped along the roof of the hallway. She waded along the hall until she reached a central intersection, then made a right, continuing until she found a closed hatch. With some effort, she opened it, bracing herself with an arm on the hallway’s handrail as the water rushed past, flooding the room beyond.

Paisen was surprised to find the room lit, with emergency pads along the ceiling producing a soft, green glow. She kept her headlamp on, however, and pushed her way over to a control panel. The electronics of the panel were no longer operating, but at the backup station, she found what she was looking for: the manual emergency controls, a confusing array of dials and levers. She ducked her head underwater for a better view and set to work.

Two minutes later, she swam back out into open water and ascended to the safety ladder, before climbing up to a small landing far below the main platform. She stripped off her helmet and air tank, situated her Forge more comfortably on her back, and drew a compact auto-rifle from a holster along her thigh. Paisen switched to infrared vision, unfolded the rifle’s stock, flipped the weapon’s safety off, and started climbing.

She saw no one else on her ascent, but heard the Hurasu blast past the platform as she neared the top level, and listened to a volley of rifle fire in response as the bright yellow craft disappeared back into the night.

Thanks, guys – keep them looking up.

The ladder ended at the edge of the platform. Paisen paused below the lip, unhooked a thumb-sized drone from her belt, and set it against the ladder. On touching the hard surface, the drone sprouted six legs, and then followed Paisen’s wireless order, scaling the pole of the ladder until it stopped just below the edge of the platform. The drone crept, slowly, over the edge, and then stopped again. Paisen connected to the drone’s live feed and studied the view, locating the guards and the nearest hatch into the platform’s super-structure. Her route planned, she recalled the drone, pocketing it. The she slid herself silently up onto the platform. The guards remained focused outward, searching for the Hurasu. She stood quickly and jogged past the burning air car, behind a set of cargo crates, and through the open hatch.

Rifle at the ready, Paisen climbed one more set of stairs, stopping at the top next to an open doorway. She could hear voices arguing inside the room. She took out the drone again, set it against the wall, and watched as it crept to the top corner of the doorway, before stopping just inside the frame. Paisen watched as it scanned across the room, using its laser designator to mark each occupant in turn.

One, two … three, four, five.

Paisen accessed her auto-rifle’s ammunition selector from her neural interface and switched to Stun – Guided. She matched each round with its designated target, then fired all five in quick succession. The rounds arced out of the barrel, hooked left through the doorway, and struck home. Paisen was close behind them, but a quick check of the room showed that her work was complete – all five men were unconscious, either on the floor or sprawled across consoles. She collected their weapons, stepped out onto the balcony briefly to dump them overboard into the sea, and then walked over to the central computer station and sat down, setting her rifle on her lap.

Warning, the screen told her. Power plant coolant levels inadequate. Core damage / melt accident likely in less than seven hours.

I know, Paisen thought. That’s what happens when you dump the coolant out of a nuclear reactor.

She sorted through several tabs, then tapped on the screen. Outside, banks of floodlights flicked on, bathing the facility in bright, white light. On the platform below her, the guards taking cover turned to look back at the control center, shielding their eyes. Paisen keyed the microphone for the PA system.

“Listen up: this fight is over. I have captured the command center, and that gunship is standing by to release air-to-ground missiles targeting your positions, on my order. Drop your weapons over the side and move to the middle of the platform.”

10

Fusoria’s sun had just appeared over the island by the time all of the facility’s personnel had gathered on the main platform. They sat in orderly rows in the early dawn light, Paisen standing over them, rifle in hand. Mikolos brought the Hurasu into a hover over the edge of the platform; Rath, standing at the open back ramp, talked him in for the landing. Rath hopped off as the craft set down and jogged over to Paisen, with Beauceron in tow.

Paisen waited until the craft’s engines had cycled down, then she pulled one of the staffers to his feet, and raised her voice.

“What’s your name?” she asked him.

“Modsu Lem,” he said.

“And your responsibilities, for the benefit of the medical personnel who may not know you?”

“I’m the supervisor of this facility.”

“Mr. Lem, what’s the status of the power plant?”

Lem closed his eyes and swallowed. “You dumped coolant. We’re going to have a meltdown in four to six hours.”

“Is the situation reversible?”

“No.”

Paisen gestured around the edge of the platform, where the lifeboats hung from their hoists, their hulls ripped and holed from cannon fire. “The air car’s destroyed, so are all the lifeboats. And in four to six hours, the nuclear core below us will melt. It will breach the walls of its containment area, and hit cold seawater. That will create steam – radioactive steam – which will build up inside the hull, and then explode once the pressure reaches a certain point. What happens to this facility at that point is anyone’s guess. But I can assure you, you don’t want to be here to find out.”

She paused, letting the news sink in. “That means this ship,” she jerked her thumb at the Hurasu, “is your only ticket off this platform. But first, we need some answers. And if we get anything less than one hundred percent cooperation, we’ll take off and leave you all here. Is everyone clear on that?” She looked across the silent crowd. “Good. Mr. Lem, you’re up first.”

She brought him into the Hurasu’s cargo hold, out of earshot of the crowd. Rath and Beauceron followed.

“We should separate the others,” Beauceron noted. “You have to keep witnesses apart during interviews.”

Paisen glanced over his shoulder at the crowd. “How are we supposed to separate that many people?”

Beauceron sighed. “Let’s just keep an eye on them and make sure they’re not talking to each other.”

“Fine. Sit,” she ordered, pointing Lem at a cargo pallet strapped to the ship’s metal deck. He sat.

“Describe to me, in detail, what operations this facility has responsibility for. Keep in mind that I’ve been trained to detect when people are lying, and your answers may decide the fate of everyone on this platform.”

“Uh, we’re responsible for all phases of Selection and Training for the … well, the Group. The Guild, you know?”

“I’m familiar with the Guild,” Paisen told him.

“Right. Potential guildsmen land on that island – we call them ‘candidates.’ There are eight there right now, and our Selection Team monitors them and communicates with them via drones. Those that pass the course get flown here.”

“And those that fail?” Rath asked.

Lem squirmed and looked away. “Group policy is that failed candidates are terminated. But I didn’t write that policy—”

“What happens if they pass?” Paisen interrupted.

“If they pass, they come here. We have medical staff – a new group just rotated in, in fact. They rehabilitate the candidates, and equip them with cybernetic implants. Then they go on to Training Phase. The candidates, I mean … not the medical staff. Training takes anywhere from six to twenty-four months, depending on the candidate. Some get more training, some get less.”

Rath and Paisen traded a look. “Why?”

“It’s based on their competency scores during Selection and Training. Exceptional candidates get extra training. The Group grooms them for tougher assignments, the higher profile ones. There’s a ranking system.”

“And after they finish Training?”

“They’re flown back to the island launch pad, and the shuttle takes them up into orbit. I don’t know what happens to them after that.”

“Where’s the control room?”

“The communications center? Up there.” He pointed across the platform at the raised super-structure.

“No, not the comms center,” Paisen shook her head. “The control room. Where the techs and supervisors monitor contractors on missions.”

“I don’t …,” Lem faltered, looking between the three of them. “We don’t have one of those. It’s just training here, we don’t see the candidates at all after they leave.”

“How many total personnel are here?” Beauceron asked.

“Including me? Eighty-three. No, eighty-four – I forgot one recent addition.”

“There are eighty-three out there,” Rath confirmed. “Headcount is on the lower end of what we thought.”

“They could be hiding others,” Paisen noted.

“Everyone’s on the platform,” Lem assured them. “We just took headcount before … while you were attacking us. There’s no one hiding.”

“Are there any contractors in Training, down in the lower levels?” Rath asked.

“None right now. We just shipped several off a couple days ago.”

“Where’s Group Headquarters located, then? Somewhere on the island?”

Lem shook his head. “I don’t think so – there’s nothing on the island except the compound where we in-process candidates. But I could be wrong. I’ve only been over once or twice, for flights in and out.”

“Then where are they?” Rath asked.

“Headquarters? I don’t know. We communicate with them over the interstellar link, but they’ve never told me where they are. I don’t need to know, so … I don’t know. And I don’t ask. Questions are kind of against company policy.”

“I bet,” Paisen spat. “Do you have access to Group financial systems? Payroll?”

“No. We don’t deal with payroll at all, we don’t even have a budget – supplies just arrive when we need them.”

Rath checked the clock in his heads-up display. “How long until the response team gets here?”

“What?” Lem asked.

Rath frowned. “You radioed in a distress call on your interstellar comms when we first arrived in system. How long until someone gets here?”

“Think carefully,” Paisen warned.

Lem’s shoulders sagged. “I don’t know. You knocked out our communications link before Headquarters told us their ETA.”

“What’s protocol in this scenario? What’s the composition of that team, and where are they located?” Paisen asked.

“I don’t know, honestly. They made it sound like they were sending someone, but it wasn’t clear who, or from where.”

“You don’t know much, do you?” Paisen pointed out.

“I’m telling you everything I do know. Honestly.”

“We’ll see,” Paisen said. She pulled Lem to his feet. “Go sit over by the landing pad, on your own.”

“I’ll take him,” Beauceron said.

“Fine.” She pointed her chin at Rath. “Find us someone else to talk to.”

Rath jogged down the ramp and wound his way through the seated crowd. He recognized no one, but he had only interacted with a handful of staffers during his visit, and most of those had been medical staff, who had undoubtedly left years ago.

“You,” he pointed at a woman. “What’s your job?”

“I’m a nurse,” she said quietly.

“Surgeon,” the man next to her reported.

“Systems maintenance.”

“Nurse.”

“A doctor.”

“Drone operator,” the next woman replied.

Rath pointed at the Hurasu. “Go talk to my friend.”

They interviewed ten different members of the staff, including a project manager, an administrative clerk, a supply officer, and even a doctor and a nurse, for good measure. All echoed Lem’s story. As the sun rose higher in the sky, Rath, Beauceron, and Paisen met on the Hurasu’s ramp.

“What’s our time looking like?” Rath asked quietly.

“The facility computer predicts containment breach in ninety minutes, at most,” Paisen said. She jerked her head at the group of interviewees over on the landing pad. “Did you get anything else out of them, Beauceron?”

“Evidence against the Guild? Yes. I recorded all of them talking about how they were recruited, how they were brought here, their compensation package, what they know about Guild operations—”

“And Headquarters?”

He shook his head. “No.”

“I don’t want to believe them, but … we’re running out of options,” Paisen admitted.

“We’re running out of time,” Rath corrected.

“I know. But I don’t want to leave empty-handed.”

“We’re not,” Rath argued. “We struck a big blow today. With nowhere to train and equip them with implants, the Group is going to be out of recruits for a long time.”

“Annoying the Group is not the same as shutting them down, or getting our money.”

Beauceron opened his mouth to speak, but Paisen brushed past him, heading for the seated captives.

“I need an answer to one simple question,” she told them. “Your colleagues have been reluctant to cooperate, and they’re putting all of your lives at risk as a result. So I’m putting it on all of you. Where is Group Headquarters?” Paisen paced along the front rank, hand on the grip of her slung rifle. “As soon as we learn that, we can load everyone up and get to safety … and we’ll be on our way.”

A fresh ocean breeze gusted over the platform, and Rath saw a number of the people shiver with cold.

“No one? Nearly a hundred employees of the Group here, and not one of you knows anything other than what happens on this godforsaken rock?” Paisen asked.

“Most of us are new here, and they don’t tell us,” a doctor called out. “We’re just here for six months, then we rotate home.”

“Suit yourself,” Paisen said. She turned and strode back toward the ship.

“Wait!”

An olive-skinned young woman wearing a bathrobe struggled to her feet. “I don’t know where it is, but I think I know someone who does.”

Paisen beckoned her forward, then walked her into the Hurasu’s cargo bay. “Explain,” she said. “Quickly.”

“I’m not an employee here, I’m a prisoner. My boyfriend and I discovered something … one of their secrets, by accident.”

Beauceron made as if to speak, but Paisen waved him off. “Keep going.”

“They brought me here as punishment. They wanted to kill me, but I … know someone, someone with a lot of influence over the organization. He made them bring me here. If you get me out of here, I’ll take you to him.”

“And he knows where Headquarters is?” Paisen asked.

The young woman bit her lip. “I think so.”

Paisen shook her head. “No deal. Tell us who this person is now, or we leave you.”

“How do I know you’re not just going to leave me here after I tell you?”

“Either way, we need to start evacuating – now,” Rath said. “If she’s bluffing, worst case is we just gave her a free ride off-world.”

“No, worst case is she’s a plant: she signals the Group when we come out of FTL, and tells them exactly where to find us,” Paisen retorted.

“They want me dead,” the young woman said. “And I wouldn’t know how to signal them, anyway.”

“She’s a risk, I don’t like it,” Paisen said.

“She’s the only lead we’ve got,” Rath said.

“What do you think?” Paisen asked Beauceron.

He started in surprise. “You’re asking me?” He looked at Paisen, then the woman. “Bring her, definitely.”

“You’re on babysitting duty, then. Watch her like a hawk – take her up front to the lounge.” She watched them disappear into the ship, then took Rath by the arm. “We should launch, now.”

“What? We need to start ferrying these people to the island, like we planned.”

Paisen set her mouth in a tight line. “There’s a response team inbound, ETA unknown. If they arrive before we launch, they’ll have the element of surprise and a significant altitude advantage on us. I don’t want to spend a minute more on this planet … so let’s just go.”

“No,” Rath shook his head. “I’m not leaving them here to die.”

Paisen’s eyes grew cold. “Don’t make the mistake of thinking this is a committee.”

“It will take three trips, an hour at most,” Rath told her. “I don’t want all of them on my conscience as well. We’ve got enough black marks in our book as it is.”

“Didn’t your training avatar teach you that developing a conscience gets you killed?”

Rath grinned. “I didn’t get as much training as you did, remember?”

Paisen stared at him, then sighed. “One hour. Then I’m leaving, regardless of who’s still on the platform. And that includes you.”

Rath picked up his auto-rifle and ran down to the platform. He pointed at the first row of captives. “Front rank, on your feet! Into the cargo hold, on the double. Second rank, stand up … follow them in.”

Rath pointed at a doctor seated in the third row. “I need your help. Take five people and head to the cafeteria, grab as much as you can carry in food supplies. And don’t forget water. I want you back up in fifteen minutes.”

Behind him, the Hurasu lifted off in a wash of hot engine exhaust. Rath turned and saw Paisen standing on the back ramp as the ship headed for the island. Then he turned back to the captives, and pointed at another doctor. “You: same deal, but I need you to get blankets, warm clothing, anything you can use to rig a shelter.”

“How long will we be on the island?” the man asked.

Rath glanced up at the cloudy sky above, searching for any sign of the approaching response team. “Probably not long at all.”

11

“We can wait in here,” Beauceron told the young woman. He showed her into the Hurasu’s lounge. “Ferrying everyone else off the platform will take some time, and we should stay out of their way. Do you need anything? Hungry, thirsty?”

“No, thank you,” she told him.

“Are you sure? It was chilly out there; I need something to warm me up. Cocoa, maybe?”

“Actually, that sounds nice.” She smiled, taking a seat on a couch.

Beauceron busied himself at the kitchen counter for a minute, then brought over two steaming mugs, handing one to her, before sitting next to her on the couch.

“Thank you.”

“Of course. I’m Martin. I was a detective in the Interstellar Police.”

“I’m Dasi. Is this an IP ship?”

“No¸” Beauceron laughed. “Nothing remotely like that.”

“Are your friends detectives, too? Is that why they’re trying to locate Headquarters?”

“They’re not detectives – and neither am I, technically. I was forced to retire a few months ago. I’ll let them introduce themselves … they’re a bit secretive.”

“Why did you have to retire?”

“I was incautious, and let myself and another officer get kidnapped. My commanders felt they couldn’t trust me anymore. I’m not sure I blame them.”

“Do you miss it?”

“Mm,” he sipped his drink. “Every day. This endeavor is certainly different, and very important to me. But I miss the day-to-day of investigations.” He was lost in thought for a moment. “What about you? Do you miss your old job?”

She curled her hands around her mug, warming them. “Somewhat … but it’s complicated. More than anything, I miss my friends – no one here was allowed to talk to me. And I miss my boyfriend. They killed him before they brought me here.”

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Beauceron said. They were both quiet for a time, then Beauceron spoke again. “I lost my wife, many years ago. She was ill, so it wasn’t unexpected. I can’t imagine how I would have felt if she had been murdered. And then if I hadn’t been able to talk to my friends and family about it … that must have been very hard for you.”

Dasi felt herself nodding, and then all at once she was crying, great sobs wracking her body. Beauceron patted her shoulder, and was surprised when she buried her face in his chest. He let her cry, and rubbed her back comfortingly.

“I’m sorry,” Dasi said. “I think I spilled some hot chocolate on you.”

“No, no – don’t worry about it.”

Dasi found a napkin on the table and dried her eyes. She sniffed, and then looked at the detective. “Martin, will you tell me what this place is?”

“You’re on a planet called Fusoria.”

“And the facility, the island … it this all part of a secret government spy program?”

“It has nothing to do with the government. This is a training area for assassins. It’s run by a criminal organization, a corporation that turns young people like you into killers-for-hire. Have you heard of the Guild?”

“No.”

“No, well … it’s more well-known on less affluent planets, where they typically recruit. The recruits are promised fifty percent of their earnings – millions of dollars – if they can complete fifty contracts for the Guild. ‘Fifty for Fifty,’ they call it. But they don’t actually pay them – they just kill them and replace them with more recruits from here.”

“And you want to shut this place down?”

“I do. I want to find the people that run the Guild, and I want to see them arrested. I want the entire organization exposed. No more killing.”

“And your friends? What do they want?”

“A similar result. Though their reasons are a bit more personal.”

Dasi folded the napkin and took a deep breath. “The senator told me my boyfriend was killed by these people. The Guild, I guess, though he didn’t name them as such.”

“The senator?”

Dasi nodded. “I better start at the beginning.”

Beauceron glanced at the aft bulkhead. “Wait until we’re off-planet. My friends will want to hear this.”

“And they might abandon me here if I tell you before we leave?”

“I very much doubt it. But … best not to tempt them.”

* * *

The Hurasu gained altitude, and Rath stood for a minute in the open ramp of the cargo bay, watching as the last group of nurses and doctors made their way up the blood-red sand of the lagoon, heading for the rest of the refugees on the island. Then the ship passed through a patch of clouds, and the island disappeared from view. He hit the switch and the ramp swung upwards.

So long, Fusoria.

Paisen was alone with Mikolos in the cockpit when he entered.

“Scope’s clear,” she told Rath. “No other ships in system.”

“Great. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“Fine by me,” Mikolos agreed. “Where to?”

“For the moment, anywhere out of system, somewhere reasonably close,” Paisen decided. “We need some time to figure things out.”

Mikolos scrolled through his navigation computer, flipping through possible destinations. “How about a deep space refueling station?”

“Fine. Just don’t go to the closest one – they’ll definitely be looking for us there. Pick one a few days out.”

By unspoken agreement, the two contractors stayed in the cockpit, eyes glued to the ship’s sensors. When the Hurasu shuddered and accelerated into faster-than-light travel, Rath exhaled and shared a look with Paisen. He gave her a tight grin.

“We’ve struck the first blow.”

She snorted. “A feeble one, perhaps. Let’s go see what our new passenger knows.”

They found the lounge empty, but walking across the hall, Beauceron was reading a datascroll at a desk in the sleeping quarters, while the young woman napped on his bunk. She woke when they entered, sitting up and rubbing her eyes. Paisen took a seat from the desk and pulled it across to sit in front of her.

“Let’s start with who you are, and why you were on Fusoria.”

Dasi looked questioningly at Beauceron. He shut the datascroll down and nodded back, smiling. “Go ahead.”

“My name is Dasi Apter. Up until a short while ago I was working public relations for Senator Charl Lizelle.”

“Chair of the Intelligence Committee?” Beauceron asked. He had his notebook and pencil out.

“Yes.”

Paisen cocked an eyebrow. “Okay, I’m listening.”

“My boyfriend, Khyron, was a developer. An independent researcher. He wrote an artificial intelligence program, and I used my connections with the senator to get access to Senate databases, so that he could test his program on them. But the program found a link – it uncovered a secret about the senator.”

“Which was?”

“Khyron only told me a little bit of it, but from what I understand, the program discovered that every time Senator Lizelle met with two other senior senators, someone died soon afterwards. He found a secret committee, basically, that was sanctioning assassinations.”

The cabin was silent for a time. Rath, leaning against the bulkhead, was the first to speak.

“Martin, you look upset.”

Beauceron rubbed his hands together, frowning. “I believe you, Dasi. It’s just … we’re talking about the Guild. The longest-running criminal conspiracy in the post-colonial era. And your boyfriend’s program thinks that politically-elected leaders not only know of it, they are actually clients of the Guild? They’re ordering hits on constituents, and paying for them with tax-payer dollars?”

“For all we know, they could be the ones controlling the Guild,” Rath pointed out.

Beauceron shook his head. “I’m just having trouble accepting that the Guild is a government-sanctioned organization. That hundreds of senators are not only aware of its existence, but have hidden it from the Interstellar Police for so long.”

“I don’t know that it is,” Dasi said.

“Is what?” Paisen asked.

“Government-sanctioned. I think Senator Lizelle and two other senators know about it, and that’s where it ends. I’ve seen how information leaks at Anchorpoint – the place is a giant sieve, and it was my job to do damage control, often. This feels like too big of a secret to be kept by more than a handful of senior leaders.”

“Who were the other two senators?” Paisen asked.

“I don’t know,” Dasi said. “Khyron never found out, either. He only identified Lizelle, and then he stopped trying to figure it out, because he got scared.”

“What did you with the information?” Beauceron asked.

“We didn’t know what to do. We were terrified. We didn’t think the police would believe us, so we went to a lawyer … but he betrayed us to Senator Lizelle.”

“Who was the lawyer?” Beauceron asked.

“A District Attorney – his name was Yellen.”

Beauceron opened his datascroll and ran a cursory search. “Disappeared,” Beauceron said, setting the datascroll down with a long sigh. “His wife filed a missing persons report and he hasn’t been seen since.”

“Dead,” Paisen corrected. “They don’t let witnesses like that slip by.”

“Keep going, Dasi,” Rath told her.

“The lawyer had us give him all the evidence. The program, the data it collected, everything. Then Senator Lizelle asked me to accompany him on a shuttle ride.” She lowered her eyes, her cheeks reddening. “The senator and I had been … intimate … in the past. So he was able to save me from … from what they did to Khyron.” She took a deep breath, collecting herself.

“It’s okay,” Beauceron reassured her.

“But I couldn’t stay at Anchorpoint,” Dasi continued, her voice trembling. “He put me on a cargo ship, and they brought me here. He visited me, just a few days ago. He told me he was going to try to get me off the planet, eventually, but he couldn’t say when.”

“That suggests he’s not pulling the strings,” Paisen pointed out.

“He’s not,” Dasi agreed. “He has some influence over things, but I think he’s in trouble with the other senators, or whoever runs the Guild, for nearly exposing them.”

Paisen studied the younger woman for a few seconds. “Do you know what the Guild is?”

“Somewhat,” Dasi admitted. “Martin told me a little about it.”

“Did he tell you who we are?” She indicated herself and Rath.

“No.”

“We’re guildsmen.”

“My boyfriend was killed by someone like you. By the Guild.”

“Then we have a fair amount in common – the Guild has been trying to kill us, too.”

“Why?” Dasi asked.

“Because it’s done with us. Because it’s cheaper to kill us than pay us,” Paisen said.

“So you want your money?” Dasi asked.

“We want the Guild exposed,” Beauceron cut in.

Paisen shot him a look. “We each have things we want. What do you want?”

Dasi looked at each of them in turn. “I don’t know. I don’t want to die. I don’t want to have to live in fear, worrying that these people are coming after me.”

Beauceron smiled. “If you can help us expose them, then you won’t have to.”

Paisen stood up. “Rath, Beauceron – I’d like to talk to you across the hall. In private.”

“Why?” Beauceron asked. “You don’t believe her?”

“I believe her, but I still don’t trust her.” She looked at Dasi. “No offense.”

“She wants to help,” Beauceron said.

“I do,” Dasi echoed. “If the Guild killed Khyron, I want … well, I want his death to count for something. He would want me to help, I think.”

“That’s noble, but I still don’t trust you.” Paisen said. She and Rath left the cabin; Beauceron shrugged by way of apology, and then followed.

In the lounge, Paisen waited until Beauceron and Rath were inside, and then palmed the door shut.

Paisen powered up the hologram projector in the middle of the table. “After we refuel, we go after the senator.” A single asteroid appeared above the table, with a cluster of ships and permanent installations attached to it.

Rath let out a low whistle. “Anchorpoint is the single most well-guarded installation in Federacy space.”

Paisen rubbed her chin.

“He’ll have his personal security detail with him at all times. Members of the elite Senate Guards,” Rath continued.

“Yes,” she agreed.

“The Group is going to figure out that we took Dasi with us off of Fusoria, and anticipate a move against the senator,” Beauceron observed.

“Yes, they are.”

Rath pressed on: “At best, they’ll warn Lizelle, and his security detail will be on high alert. At worst, they’ll try to put a team there ahead of time and lay a trap for us.”

“That’s what I’d do,” Paisen agreed.

Rath rubbed his forehead. “Fuck.”

“We need to keep unraveling this thread,” Paisen argued. “If anyone knows where Group Headquarters is, it’s this senator. He has to.”

Rath glanced at Beauceron, who shrugged. “Well, let’s find out,” Rath conceded. “Anchorpoint’s a ways away, but—”

There was a gentle knock at the door. Paisen walked over and opened it with a frown.

“I wasn’t listening,” Dasi said meekly. “I mean, I couldn’t hear anything, even if I had wanted to. But I forgot something.”

“What?” Paisen asked.

“Are you hoping to find Senator Lizelle?”

“Possibly,” Paisen said.

“Yes,” Rath said, at the same time. Paisen shot him a look of annoyance.

“Well, if so, you need to go to Emerist.”

“Emerist?” Paisen asked.

“The Senate’s not in session, so the senators all leave Anchorpoint, and most go back to their homeworlds. Lizelle visited me on Fusoria, and when he left, he told me he was going back to his home on Emerist to do some fundraising.”

“Have you been there?” Beauceron asked.

“Yes. Wait, did you mean to Emerist, or the senator’s home? I’ve been to Emerist, and I’ve also spent some time at the senator’s house.”

Beauceron smiled, while Rath suppressed a chuckle. Paisen scowled at both of them, then walked back over to the table. She swiped away the 3D model of Anchorpoint, replacing it with a hologram of Emerist.

“Well, you better come in, then.”

12

“Definite traces of engine emissions,” the pilot told his passenger. “Someone was up here in orbit, pretty recently.”

“How recently?”

The pilot fiddled with his sensor computer, and a thin line appeared on the canopy heads-up display, extending out from the planet. “An hour, maybe less. Headed that way, accelerating to FTL.”

“Can you tell where they were going?” 700 asked.

The pilot shook his head. “No. I mean, their initial heading narrows it down some, but no FTL route is perfectly straight … and if they were worried they were being followed, they would probably stop and change course, or even double back. Which means they could be anywhere now.”

A notification from Headquarters popped up in 700’s neural interface.

<Report in>

“I need to make a call,” he told the pilot. “Head down to the surface.”

“Sure,” the pilot agreed. He swung the craft’s nose around, and pointed it back toward the grey mass of Fusoria.

They started at the platform; 700 had the pilot make two low passes, and they even hailed the facility over the external speakers, to no avail. 700 established an uplink to Headquarters and streamed his feed to them, so they could examine the damage themselves.

“Communications array and weapons emplacements show signs of high-velocity impacts,” he noted, for their benefit. “Damage to the air car and lifeboats, as well. Put me down on the upper deck.”

The pilot hovered, and 700 clambered down a ladder extending from under the ship’s starboard wing.

“Radio check,” he said, upon setting foot on the metal deck.

“I have you,” the pilot responded.

“I’m on board. Circle the facility until I’m ready for pickup.”

“Roger.” The craft throttled up and peeled off, taking up station several thousand feet away.

700 unholstered his auto-pistol and headed into the super-structure. He swept the living quarters first, then the medical bays. He found the cafeteria a mess, with packets of food spilled across the floor, and several refrigerators left open. In the medical bays, one of the linen closets was open, and several sheets lay on the floor nearby. He swept a hand along the empty shelf.

“People were here very recently,” he told Headquarters. “I can still smell body odors.”

Suddenly, with an audible groaning of metal, the facility tilted to the left several degrees. 700 grabbed the shelf to steady himself.

“Structural issues,” he called out, running for the elevators. “Heading for the command center to download security footage and logs. Pilot, I need you standing by.”

“Yeah, I’m coming. You don’t have long. One of the pylons looks like it just released a big cloud of steam from below the water level.”

In the elevator, 700 punched the button for the command center level. He could feel the facility continuing to tilt. Then his hemobots sent him an urgent warning.

“I’m getting elevated radiation levels,” he announced, hitting the button for the landing platform. “Facility’s unsafe, no time to download command center files. I’ll send a drone if it stays afloat long enough.”

The doors slid open, and 700 saw just how far the deck had tilted compared to the horizon. The ship was hovering as close to the super-structure as the pilot could get; 700 dashed across and grabbed the ladder.

“Take us out,” he ordered.

Back inside the ship, he used his Forge to build a micro-drone, and then tossed it out the ship’s hatch, sending it back toward the heavily listing platform. Then he closed his Forge and slipped the straps back on.

“We’re over the compound now,” the pilot told him over the radio. “No signs of life.”

700 leaned out the open hatch, peering down at the island and the cement structure below. “Radiation levels?” he asked.

“Normal,” the pilot reported.

“Set down on the shuttle landing pad.”

700 spent ten minutes searching the compound, then jogged back to the ship.

“Take me back up to altitude.”

They flew up over the jungle, following the curve of the mountains. When they crested the top, the lagoon on the far side appeared below them, stretching out to either side.

“There they are,” the pilot said. He pointed the ship toward the beach, and the mass of people huddled near the tree line, making a single pass over them before landing close to the water’s edge. 700 hopped off into the soft, red sand. Two men hurried toward him. From the briefing Headquarters had sent him, he recognized them as the security team commander and the facility supervisor.

“I’m uplinked to Headquarters,” he told them, as they drew up. “They’re asking for a full report.”

The men shared a look, and then the captain spoke. “We were attacked. Two men and a woman, on board a small freighter or exploration vessel, as best I could tell. They neutralized the orbital drones, then hit us with kinetic darts – that’s when we lost comms with Headquarters. The ship strafed us a few times – it was a distraction, mainly. The woman infiltrated us by blasting her way into one of the pylons underwater. She overheated the reactor, and then they threatened to leave us on the platform when it melted it down. We had no choice but to comply.”

“What did they want?”

The administrator cleared his throat. “Information about the Group. The location of Headquarters, mainly. They asked about payroll and finances, too.”

“And what did you tell them?”

The administrator held up his hands. “Nothing. I don’t know any of that information, you can check with Headquarters.”

“They interviewed about a dozen staffers,” the captain continued. “Same questions for all of them. Then they shuttled us in groups over here. They left maybe ninety minutes ago. Not long.”

“Any clue as to where they were headed?”

“No,” the captain shook his head. “But there’s something else. They took someone with them when they left: a girl. Not someone from the Group.”

“A nurse?” 700 asked.

“No. A senator’s aide. Dasi Apter.”

“What the hell is a senator’s aide doing here?”

“Good question. You’ll have to ask Headquarters.”

The three men heard a high-pitched whine, and looked up to see a large, military-style transport descending from the clouds.

* * *

“That’s the response team arriving,” the tech noted, watching 700’s visual feed on the conference room viewscreen.

Supervisor Altaras looked across the table at Feykin. “Who the fuck is Dasi Apter, and what was she doing on Fusoria?”

The Chief of Operations held up a hand. “I’ll update you on that offline.”

“If we don’t have all of the information we need, this Crisis Team can only be so effective,” Altaras warned him.

“For now, all you need to know is she’s a former employee of Senator Lizelle. Who, we recently learned, is one of the three senators that provides oversight to Group operations.”

“I thought the oversight committee was anonymous?” another supervisor asked.

“They were. Two of them still are,” Feykin said. “Getting back to the mission. 339 and 621: what’s their next move?”

“What might they have learned about the Group on Fusoria?” the supervisor asked.

“Little to nothing new,” Altaras commented. “The staff there is pretty isolated, and everything’s restricted to Selection and Training processes. They don’t know anything about real world operations.”

“But they have Dasi now,” Feykin pointed out.

“Well, what does she know?” Altaras shot back.

“We have to assume, since she’s now linked up with 339 and 621, that they collectively know about Senator Lizelle and his role in the Group.”

The Crisis Team considered that in silence. Altaras spoke first.

“Our working hypothesis is that they’re aiming to locate Headquarters, and then use that information as leverage to obtain their money. If that’s the case, I think their next logical move will be to contact Lizelle. Which means they’re headed for Anchorpoint, in all likelihood.”

Feykin checked his computer. “Actually, Senator Lizelle was on Fusoria several days ago.” He held up a hand, silencing the inevitable questions from the team. “He was visiting this Dasi woman. He had permission to do so, and that’s all I know. But we also know that after he left Fusoria, he took his personal ship to Emerist.” He looked up. “Not Anchorpoint.”

“Can we get someone to confirm that’s where he is now?” Altaras asked. “And how long he’ll be there?”

“On it,” the tech affirmed.

Altaras cocked an eyebrow. “We can assemble a team ….”

“Yes,” Feykin agreed. “Do we have assets there? Or nearby?”

Altaras consulted his datascroll. “No. Emerist is pretty isolated. It’s a few days’ journey, but our assets on Fusoria are actually the closest. 700 and the response team.”

“339 and 621 will need to refuel,” the other supervisor pointed out. “It was a long haul from Aleppo to Fusoria. I don’t think that scout ship has the range for another multi-day trip.”

“How much fuel does the response team on Fusoria have?” Feykin asked.

The tech ran a search query in his computer. “Not enough. We can confirm, but I don’t think they can make it without stopping, too.”

“What about the ship 700 came in on?” the supervisor asked.

“… same,” the tech noted, shaking his head.

“What if we transfer fuel from 700’s ship to the response team’s ship?” Altaras suggested. “I mean, we need to confirm with the pilots exactly how much they’re carrying … but combined, it might be enough. They could do the transfer in an hour or two, at most.”

“… and then fly the response team direct to Emerist,” Feykin agreed, smiling. “Open a line to 700.”

* * *

“Secure connection established,” the robotic voice announced.

Director Nkosi took a seat at her desk. “Senators, thank you for joining on short notice.”

“I had to turn down a TV appearance, Director – this better be important.”

“I apologize, Senator, but I think you’ll agree the situation warrants it.”

“And what situation is that?”

“The Group’s Selection and Training facility has been compromised and attacked. We are developing contingency plans to re-establish those operations elsewhere, but it will take us some time to have things up and running. The damage to our financials will not be permanent, but … there will be some after-effects, while our resource pipeline recovers.”

“Who attacked you?”

“Our response team just arrived on scene. Interviews with survivors indicate the attack was carried out by two males and a female. Their objective was to discover the location of Group Headquarters.”

“And did they?”

“No. The manner of the attack and their objective strongly suggest that the attackers are our two rogue contractors, aided by a former Interstellar Police detective.”

“IP is involved? Jesus Christ.”

“No, Senator – they are not. I can assure you, if IP ever learned the location of our facilities, I would be the first to know. The detective is not operating in any official capacity. He was recently forced to retire; I’m led to believe it was due to poor job performance. We’re still trying to uncover how he became involved with the rogue contractors, however, or why.”

“How did they find the planet?” one of the senators asked.

“Our Crisis Team is working on that. But our best way to determine that will be to capture the rogue contractors, which we now have an excellent opportunity to do.”

“You mentioned survivors,” one of the senators noted. Unlike the other two, his voice was not electronically disguised – she recognized it as Senator Lizelle’s. “Do we have a list of those who were killed in the attack?”

“The attack was quite bloody,” she lied, “and we’re still getting accountability for all of the injured and dead. I’m sorry to be the bearer of bad news, Senator, but I’m afraid your associate was one of those murdered by the attackers.”

The line was silent for a time. When Lizelle spoke, his voice was flat and emotionless. “How did it happen?”

“According to eyewitnesses, after the initial assault, the attackers landed and began interrogating survivors. It seems your associate volunteered to assist them, in return for safe passage off the planet. She talked to the attackers for some time, and then they shot her. They departed the planet immediately afterwards. Again, my condolences, Senator.”

“It was a mistake to bring her there, Charl,” one of the other senators noted. “The entire Group is at risk now, as are we.”

Lizelle said nothing.

Nkosi broke the silence. “I think we must assume the rogue contractors are now headed for Senator Lizelle, to continue their search for information. For your safety, sir, I must insist you notify your security detail.”

After a few seconds, one of the other senators spoke. “Charl?”

“Yes, I’m sorry. Of course,” he said. “We’ll need to take precautions.”

“Senator, I’ll send you what information we have on the attackers, so your detail can prepare appropriately. Can I also suggest that you augment your normal security team with Group assets?” Nkosi asked.

“No,” Lizelle told her. “My men will be sufficient.”

“Very well,” Nkosi agreed, smiling to herself. “But please warn them not to underestimate the threat.”

One of the other senators spoke. “Did that girl know of our identities?”

“No,” Lizelle said. “I told you already, she did not. She only knew I was involved.”

“Still,” the other senator noted, “this is rapidly getting out of hand. Rogue contractors, an IP detective … an attack on Group assets. Put an end to this farce, Director. Now.”

“We have plans in place to do just that, Senators. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m expecting another report from the response team. I will update you as we learn more.”

13

Dasi slipped out of her bunk, wrapped the blanket around her shoulders, and padded silently across the dark cabin. She opened the door to the hall, glancing back over her shoulder briefly, then walked across to the lounge. Rath looked up from the table, where he was studying the 3D model of Lizelle’s airship.

“Couldn’t sleep?” he asked.

“No. Well, I couldn’t get back to sleep.” Her cheeks colored in embarrassment.

“Ah,” he said. “Sorry if I woke you.”

“It’s fine,” she said. She took a seat across from him at the table. “Do you always get nightmares?”

“Every night,” he said. “I’ve had to learn to get by on very little sleep.”

She pulled the blanket tighter around her. “I had nightmares for a while, too, after Khyron died. They’ve been less often of late. But living with the guilt is still … hard.” She shrugged. “It sucks.”

“Mm,” Rath agreed. He rotated the model, and zoomed in on the senator’s mansion. “Sometimes I think I deserve to live a guilt-ridden, sleepless life. And probably a short one at that.”

“Have you tried talking to someone about … what’s bothering you?” she asked. “I felt a bit better after talking to Martin.”

“What, like a therapist?” Rath laughed. “No. The Group would have killed me for talking to anyone about what I did.”

“But you’re out of the Group. So you can find a therapist now,” she suggested.

“Well, first I need to ensure the Group is no longer hunting me down, and then Martin needs me on the witness stand, and then – perhaps – I’ll go see the psychiatrist, in whatever jail they throw me in.”

“Oh,” Dasi said. “All right.”

“It’s a good suggestion,” Rath backpedaled, “I didn’t mean to shoot it down. It’s just … pretty far down the priority list right now.” He decided to change the subject. “What’s next for you, after all this?”

Dasi put her arms on the table, and rested her chin on her hands. “I have no idea. This is all so … god, I don’t even know how to describe it. I was on a good career track, saving for a nice apartment, we were planning a big trip next year. Now …,” she trailed off. “I don’t even know. What do you think I should do?”

Rath snorted. “I’m the last person you should be getting career advice from.”

“Until you asked, I hadn’t even thought about it. Are they going to arrest me, too?”

“I don’t think so,” Rath said. “I mean, talk to Martin, he’s the expert. But you haven’t committed any crimes, right? Aside from helping us, I guess. But you can just tell them we kidnapped you.”

“Well, assuming they don’t arrest me, I don’t think I want to go back into politics,” she mused. “Not after what I’ve learned.”

“Why did you choose politics in the first place?”

“I thought it was the best opportunity to make a difference to people that needed help. To be a voice for people that couldn’t stand up for themselves. And we did make a difference, we really changed some peoples’ lives for the better.”

“Well, that’s what you need to find, then,” Rath said.

“What?”

“Something where you can help people. If it’s not politics, then maybe something on a smaller scale.”

She smiled. “I thought you said you were a lousy guidance counselor.”

The door to the lounge slid open, and Captain Mikolos appeared. “Twenty minute warning,” he said. “Shall I wake up the others?”

“No,” Rath told him. “I’ll get them, thanks.”

Just one other ship was docked at the refueling station, but Paisen was taking no chances. Before they went forward to the cockpit, she insisted that Rath and Beauceron arm themselves in case of a boarding party. Mikolos brought them into their slip without incident, however, and a drone attached the refueling hose minutes later.

Mikolos checked the ship’s computer. “We’ll be topped off in under an hour,” he told them.

The radio crackled to life. “Payment accepted for fuel. You need any other supplies, Hurasu?”

Mikolos looked to Paisen. She shook her head silently.

“No, thank you,” Mikolos radioed back. “Just a brief stop for gas this time.”

“You got it.” The radio clicked off.

“You’ll stay up here and watch the long-range sensors, in case anyone else enters the system while we’re here?” Paisen asked Mikolos.

“Of course,” he agreed.

“Okay. Let me know the minute you see anything.”

In the lounge, Paisen set her Forge on the table, and placed Rath’s next to it.

“Twenty-eight percent reserves,” she said, pointing to her Forge. “And Rath, you’re at nine percent.”

“Getting real low,” Rath noted. “Think the refueling station has refills?”

“No,” Paisen said. “I checked their inventory, they don’t even stock them – too expensive, and too niche.”

“Well, we still have weapons and ammo from the Fusoria raid, so we should be set on hardware,” Rath said.

“Yes,” Paisen rubbed her chin. “I’m wondering if we want to use our remaining reserves to make the prototype.”

“The what?” Beauceron asked.

“The prototype I took from Rogan Dan, back on New Liberia.”

“I thought that was a high energy research project,” Beauceron said.

“It is.” Paisen wiped the 3D model of the senator’s mansion away, and plugged a data drive into the hologram projector on the table. An engineering schematic appeared, rotating slowly. “The research was on a high energy weapon prototype.”

Dasi cocked her head to one side. “It looks like an old-fashioned sewing machine.”

“It’s big,” Paisen corrected her. “About the size of this table.”

Beauceron frowned. “What does it do?”

“According to the research paper I took off of their archives, it’s an energy teleportation device. It transports energy between the base unit, here, and an object of your choosing.” She picked up a datascroll on the table. “This datascroll, say. I would put the object in the unit, here,” she held the datascroll in the hologram, “and then I could take it wherever I chose to, up to several miles away. When I’m ready, I send the base unit a signal, and it sends energy into the object, from a distance.”

“Like a laser?” Rath asked.

“I don’t think so. The energy being transported is undetectable. And it passes through other objects – walls, for instance – without disturbing them. It just collects in the object that you designate. Then, when the energy reaches a certain level, the object explodes, releasing the energy.”

“Where does it get the energy from?” Dasi asked.

“An external power source, and it needs to be a big one. The Hurasu’s batteries, for instance.”

Beauceron walked around the table to look at the schematic from a different angle. “You can designate any object to receive the energy? Anything at all?”

“Yes,” Paisen said. “According to their research paper, the material you use determines the explosive force that results. Paper just bursts into flame immediately, for instance. A ceramic mug would produce a result similar to a fragmentation grenade.”

“So density affects the explosive yield?” Rath asked.

“Mm-hm. Metal was the most destructive. They tested it on a twenty-pound lead weight – it had explosive force equivalent to a very low-yield nuclear detonation.”

Rath rubbed his chin. “The concept has very interesting possibilities.”

Beauceron shook his head slowly. “What you’re describing sounds like the ultimate terrorist weapon. It uses everyday objects, which are easily carried through security checkpoints, then activated remotely, with extreme lethality. This is … an abomination.”

Paisen gave a wry smile. “Perhaps. But it’s our abomination.”

“It’s not just ours. You stole these plans, and sold them to a third party,” Beauceron reminded her. “Who?”

“I was hired anonymously,” Paisen told him, exasperated. “I have no way of knowing who bought it.”

“My god,” Beauceron said. “We have to find out.”

“You’re welcome to try, when all this is over. But right now, we need to decide: do we build this thing with our remaining Forge capacity, or not?”

“No,” Beauceron said, at once. “It’s too dangerous.”

“We may need it,” Paisen argued. “Just building it doesn’t mean we have to use it.”

“If we’re captured, and the Group finds it, we’ve armed the most dangerous organization in the galaxy with a super-weapon they’re bound to abuse,” Beauceron replied.

Dasi held up her hands. “It scares me, but I’ll defer to the experts.”

Paisen turned to Rath. “You’re the tie-breaker.”

“I thought you said this wasn’t a committee,” he reminded her.

“We’ll need to use the last of our Forge reserves,” she replied. “That potentially puts us at a major disadvantage.”

“Fuck,” he exhaled noisily. “This thing is terrifying. But I’m sorry, Martin. I say we build it, just in case. And we destroy the plans, and destroy the device itself as soon as we’ve taken down the Group.”

* * *

“That’s the last component,” Rath said, wiping sweat from his brow. “Hook it up.”

Paisen lifted the Hurasu’s deck plate and slid the power cable into an open port on the ship’s auxiliary battery pack. “It’s attached.”

Rath turned on the datascroll affixed to the side of device, which served as a makeshift control panel. On the screen, he opened the Settings menu, and selected Power On. They both took a half step back.

“Well, that was anticlimactic,” Rath said, after a few seconds.

The door slid open, and Beauceron walked into the cargo bay. “Done?” he asked.

“It’s on,” Rath told him. “I think.”

“We need to test it,” Paisen said. She checked the time in her heads-up display. “We’ve got less than an hour before we arrive at Emerist.”

“Martin, can I have your notepad for a second?”

Beauceron pulled out his notebook and handed it to Rath, who tore out a single sheet of paper and then handed the book back. Rath placed the paper in the device’s scanner tray, and then tapped on the control panel. A grid of red lasers appeared momentarily, criss-crossing the sheet of paper.

“The scanner works,” Paisen observed.

Rath picked up a small bracelet from the workbench, and slid it onto his wrist. He tapped a button on the bracelet. The control panel on the main device lit up and beeped back at him. “Detonator bracelet’s got a good signal connection to the base unit.”

Paisen picked up the sheet of paper, and they followed her as she left the cargo bay and walked up the ship’s corridor to the cockpit. The door slid closed behind them.

“This is about as far away as we can get. Maybe fifty meters, with two bulkheads in between us and the base.”

“Ready?” Rath asked.

“Ready.”

Rath tapped the button on the bracelet again. In Paisen’s hand, the sheet of paper burst into flames, disintegrating in an instant. She dropped it hurriedly, and stamped out the cinders when they reached the floor.

“I’d call that a successful test,” Rath said, grinning.

“Yeah,” Paisen agreed.

Beauceron grimaced. “God help us.”

They found Dasi reading a datascroll in the lounge.

“Are you ready?” Paisen asked her.

“Sure,” Dasi agreed.

She stood up and faced the older woman. Paisen studied her face: the curve of her jaw, her cheekbones, the color of her eyes. Dasi watched, fascinated, as Paisen’s face transformed, her skin darkening, the hair changing color and lengthening.

“I feel like I’m going to be sick,” Dasi said, when Paisen was finished.

“I feel like I’m going to be sick,” Paisen echoed, testing the vocal match. Then she walked over to the table and called up the hologram of Lizelle’s airship. “Let’s walk through it one last time.”

“From our infiltration?” Rath asked.

“No, we’ve covered that enough. We’ll skip ahead to starting positions on the airship.”

Rath pointed to a small, wooded rise on the grounds of the estate. “I’m in a concealed overwatch position here, ready to support-by-fire.”

“I’m with Rath,” Dasi said.

“Doing what?” Paisen prompted.

Dasi patted a set of binoculars at her waist. “Scanning the mansion, helping Rath gather intelligence.”

“Right,” Paisen said. “Martin?”

“I’m on the hoverbike, with you, out of visual range.”

“I signal that we’re in position,” Rath said. “And that Senator Lizelle is in the building.”

“I bring the hoverbike in, and drop Paisen off close to the front entrance,” Beauceron replied.

“In this clearing, here,” Paisen pointed, enlarging the model for a better view.

“Right,” Beauceron agreed. “Then I fly out of there, back to the Hurasu, and wait for your next signal.”

“I approach the front entrance and gain access, unarmed, posing as Dasi,” Paisen recited.

“I monitor your conversation over the radio,” Dasi said, “and feed you personal details via your heads-up display, to ensure Senator Lizelle believes that you are me.”

“Contingency plan,” Rath said. “If they don’t buy it, and attempt to capture you, I provide suppressive fire while you withdraw. We call in the Hurasu for extract.”

Paisen continued: “Assuming I get access, I isolate the senator from his guards, and maneuver him outside the mansion. When ready, I signal Hurasu for pickup.”

“I’m not clear on how you’re going to get the senator alone,” Beauceron said. “His guards are going to be on alert, assuming the Group warned them about our attack on Fusoria, and Dasi’s disappearance. How are you going to get him where we need him?”

“With my feminine charm,” Paisen said, flipping her hair and giving him a coy smile. “Or rather, Dasi’s feminine charm.”

“Ah,” Beauceron said, blushing.

Dasi shuddered. “I feel like I need to take a shower.”

“When Paisen signals for pickup, I toss noisemakers and open fire on the house as a diversion,” Rath said, continuing the rehearsal.

“Pickup complete,” Paisen said. “Lizelle and I are on board the Hurasu, with Beauceron. We swing around and pick up Rath and Dasi.”

“… and make for deep space,” Rath finished. “As fast as fucking possible.”

They stood silent for a minute, studying the hologram.

“It sounds so simple,” Dasi commented.

“The best plans are the simple ones,” Paisen told her.

“There is another contingency we haven’t covered,” Rath said. “What if the Group predicts our next play, and is able to get contractors on Emerist ahead of us?”

“I’m not getting captured again,” Paisen told him. “So that’s what these are for.”

She set four small metal discs on the table, each marked with a letter, along with four detonator bracelets.

“You intend to scan the discs with the high energy device?” Beauceron asked.

“Yeah,” Paisen said. “Each of us carries one, along with a bracelet.”

Dasi picked up a bracelet and examined it. “The bracelets will only detonate our own disc, or everyone’s disc at once?”

“They each have a dial, with five settings. It can detonate whoever’s disc you select, or all of them at once,” Paisen said. “I twist it to ‘P’ for Paisen, and click the button. That way, if one of us is captured and can’t do it themselves, the others can … help them. If needed.”

“How big will the explosion be?” Beauceron asked.

“I honestly don’t know,” Paisen said. “Definitely big enough to kill you. Probably big enough to take out anyone nearby, too.”

An uncomfortable silence settled over the group. Rath picked up the disc labeled R and eyed it distastefully. Then he slid it into his left shirt pocket, and eyed each member of the group in turn.

“If anyone blows my disc without making a solid effort to rescue me first, I’m going to haunt their ass for the rest of their life.”

14

“Here it comes,” Rath warned Dasi.

She sat behind him on the hoverbike, and despite being attached to him via a harness, he could feel her arms squeezing him tightly around the waist. They hovered inside a thick cloud, and Rath knew that Dasi could only see a few feet in each direction – nothing but yellow-grey mist on every side. But his thermal vision penetrated the cloud, and through it, Rath could see Senator Lizelle’s airship approaching above them.

Probably best that she can’t see anything … she’s nervous enough.

Rath’s Forge was empty, its canisters depleted to construct Paisen’s high energy weapon prototype. But he wore it anyway, reluctant to part with it after so many missions. He felt strangely naked knowing it was empty, however. He caught himself adjusting the strap again.

“Is something wrong?” Dasi asked.

“No,” Rath told her. He pulled the grappling gun out of a makeshift holster along the side of the hoverbike. “Ready?”

“No,” Dasi said.

Rath shouldered the grappling gun, tracking the blimp-like vehicle as it slid slowly overhead.

“Just make sure you don’t drop me,” Dasi pleaded.

“I won’t,” Rath promised.

He fired the gun and the grappling hook streaked up, disappearing into the cloud above, trailing the wire behind it. After a few seconds, the wire went taut, and Rath felt the hoverbike begin to slide as the airship pulled them forward.

Here we go.

Rath activated the winch on his vest, and suddenly they swung free of the hoverbike, rising quickly. Dasi gave a yelp of alarm. Rath patted her hands reassuringly. The hoverbike disappeared into the cloudy gloom below them a second later. Soon after that, they emerged from the cloud entirely, and Rath got his first good look at the underside of the airship.

The hook’s a little low – we’re going to have to do some climbing.

He had harpooned the massive vehicle on one of the spherical gas balloons that supported it as it floated through Emerist’s upper atmosphere. But the balloon was in no danger of losing air pressure – it was built of self-sealing material, impossible to permanently rupture. Rath focused on the grappling hook above him, which was approaching fast.

As the balloon loomed closer, he spread his hands and feet wide, ensuring the magnetic pads on each were oriented toward the surface of the balloon. They landed hard, but Rath pressed himself against the skin of the balloon, ignoring the sharp pain of the impact. The magnets held.

“Are we on?” Dasi asked.

“Yeah,” Rath grunted. “That hurt.”

“Are you okay?”

“Uh huh,” he said. “Okay, I need you to shift a bit, and try to get your hands and feet on the balloon, too.”

“With the pads, right?”

“Right.”

Dasi let go of Rath with one hand, and he saw it appear next to his own on the skin of the balloon. He felt her legs press against his a moment later.

“Good,” he told her. “Now undo the harness.”

“I don’t know if I can.”

“You gotta try, Dasi.”

“Um,” she said. “I just looked down. I shouldn’t have done that.”

“Okay,” Rath said. “Just feel for the clip with your hand.”

Rath heard a metallic click.

“Good, now put your hand back on the ship. There you go. I’m going to duck under your arm.”

Rath slid his own arms under Dasi’s, keeping the magnets pressed against the balloon, and then extricated his feet, until he was hanging by her side. She looked terrified, and he could see her arms and legs trembling. He gave her a reassuring smile.

“Alright, that’s the hard part. Now we just have to go up.”

It took them nearly fifteen minutes of slow, cautious shuffling, but at last they reached the top of the airship. Rath stayed still for a minute, hanging from cramping muscles and panting with the exertion.

God damn it … were my hemobots really helping me that much?

Carefully, Rath slipped his head up over the rim of the airship. He found a thick glass safety wall running along the top side of the ship; through it, Rath could see a sprawling park, and far off to his right, the senator’s mansion.

“What the fuck …,” he breathed.

A thick column of smoke poured out of the woods near the house, and as he zoomed in through his cybernetic eye implants, Rath saw that the house’s main entrance had been blasted in by a massive explosion, and several of the windows showed bullet holes.

“Paisen, come in,” Rath radioed. He made himself exhale, and count to ten.

“Paisen or Beauceron, this is Rath, over.”

Dasi pulled herself up next to him and gasped. “Oh my god,” she said. “That’s the senator’s shuttle landing pad.”

“What is?”

“The smoke, from the trees over there. That’s where they park his shuttle. What happened?”

“I don’t know,” Rath said. “Paisen, do you read me? Dasi, try radioing them, I’m not getting through.”

“Paisen, are you there?” Dasi said into her throat-mic. She shook her head.

Rath frowned. “Are you hearing me on your earpiece when I broadcast? Radio check, over.”

Dasi shook her head. “No. What does that mean?”

“It means someone’s jamming our communications.”

“What do we do?” Dasi asked. Rath could hear the panic in her voice.

“We quit dangling out here, for starters.”

He detached a tool from his utility belt, and with a swing of his arm, punched it into the glass. He sawed left first, then right, cutting a rough triangle of glass out, before pushing it inwards. Rath boosted Dasi through, then pulled himself up. He set the triangle of glass back in place, then grabbed Dasi’s hand, and they sprinted for the nearest set of trees.

“Paisen, come in,” Rath said, pushing his way through the undergrowth. “I’m not receiving you, but if you can hear me, we’re on board, moving to the overwatch position. Someone’s already attacked Lizelle – they torched his shuttle and it looks like they fought their way into the house, too.”

He stopped as the trees began to thin out, and pulled Dasi down to the ground beside him.

“We crawl from here. That bush over there will work.”

When they were under the bush, Rath pulled a camouflage net out of his rucksack, and draped it quickly over himself and Dasi. Then he unslung his auto-rifle, unfolding the bipod and snugging the weapon into his shoulder, before flipping the dust cover off the rifle’s scope. Dasi took out her binoculars and wriggled closer to him, propping herself up on her elbows.

“Paisen, if you can hear me, we’re in position,” Rath reported.

“I think I see a body,” Dasi said.

“Where?”

“By the main entrance, just to the right.”

“I see it,” Rath said. “Fuck.”

He spent a minute scanning the house, switching from window to window, searching the house and the grounds in his field of view.

“Paisen, this is Rath, over.”

He swore again, then pulled the camouflage net off.

“What are you doing?” Dasi asked.

“Getting Paisen’s attention,” Rath said. He selected High Explosive on the weapon’s variable rounds, programming them to detonate after five hundred feet. Then he pointed the rifle into the air and squeezed off three rounds.

BOOM … BOOM … BOOM.

The hoverbike appeared out of the clouds less than a minute later. Rath saw Beauceron brake when he sighted the airship, then change course, heading for Rath’s location. He set down behind the copse of trees, and moments later, Paisen led Beauceron to the bush. They lay down next to Rath, and Dasi passed Beauceron the binoculars.

“If anyone’s alive in there, they know we’re coming now,” Paisen told Rath, with some annoyance.

He shrugged. “I couldn’t think of any other way of signaling you.”

“Any signs of life?” she asked.

“No.”

“Who did this?” she asked.

Beauceron set the binoculars down. “Did the senator get any threats while you worked for him, Dasi?”

“I don’t know. I never really talked to the security guys.”

“I’ve got a really bad feeling about this,” Rath said.

“Really?” Paisen asked, sarcastically. “Is it the corpse on the lawn, the comms jamming, or the wide open front door?”

“There may be injured people in there that need help,” Beauceron pointed out.

“We could send in a drone to scout it out,” Rath suggested.

“No point,” Paisen said. “With our signals jammed, we wouldn’t be able to control it or access its feed.”

“Perhaps it’s not us they’re jamming,” Beauceron suggested. “Perhaps the attackers just wanted to ensure that Senator Lizelle’s security detail couldn’t call for help.”

Rath sighed. “Could be. I don’t know. I say we pull back, notify the cops, and let them investigate. If Lizelle’s alive, they’ll want to get him off-planet ASAP. We can try to intercept him when they take him to the spaceport, or at the orbital transfer station.”

Paisen shook her head. “Neither of those are high probability scenarios for us. Too much risk, too many variables.”

“This whole thing feels like a trap,” Rath said. “What do you want to do?”

Paisen pursed her lips. “Spring the trap.”

They bounded forward in pairs, one group providing cover while the other moved. In less than five minutes, they had traversed the grounds of the estate, and found themselves at the foot of a sweeping granite staircase that led up to the front door. The corpse they had spotted from the overwatch position lay at the top of the stairs. Rath moved up the stairs, and stopped short of the top, pushing the body over onto its back. The man wore a suit and tie, and Rath saw an ID card hanging from a clip at his waist. He held up the badge so that the others could see it.

“Senate Guard,” he mouthed, then shouldered his auto-rifle and knelt at the top of the stairs, covering the mansion’s front entrance.

Paisen knelt behind him and tapped his shoulder a few seconds later; he stood and jogged to the building, flattening himself against the wall to the right of the blasted door. He nodded to Paisen, and she took up a position on the opposite side.

“Three, two, one,” she counted.

Rath turned the corner first and swept right, heading for the near corner of the entrance hall. Paisen was right on his heels, and split left. Each stopped in their corner, scanning the room.

“Clear,” Rath said quietly. He counted three more bodies on the floor.

“Martin,” Paisen whispered.

Beauceron and Dasi stepped inside – the detective had refused to carry a weapon for the mission, and Dasi had followed suit, having never fired a gun. The young woman gasped when she saw the bodies.

“Stay behind us,” Paisen told them.

They cleared the ground floor in five minutes, and were halfway through the second floor when Rath stopped mid-stride. He gestured at the others to stop moving.

“Did you hear that?” he whispered.

She shook her head.

“It was faint, but I thought I heard a foot-fall,” Rath said.

Then both of them froze.

“Yeah, I heard that,” Paisen replied. “Upstairs.”

“What?” Beauceron whispered.

Rath held up his rifle and mimed cocking it, then pointed his finger at the ceiling. He followed Paisen back out of the room. She took the lead on the staircase, placing each foot carefully, one at a time, rifle trained on the landing above. She crouched as her head neared the level of the floor, and taking a deep breath, popped up for a quick look.

Two different guns opened fire; Paisen threw herself down flat on the stairs, and the bullets cracked past where her head had been only moments before. The rounds continued to smack into the wall above them, raining down plaster.

“Two of them,” Paisen told Rath, under the noise of the shooting. “Look like security personnel, in doorways on opposite sides of the hall. I saw Lizelle, too. He’s alive.”

The fusillade stopped as suddenly as it had begun.

“Dasi?” a voice called. “Dasi, was that you?”

Rath pointed at Paisen, who was still mimicking Dasi’s appearance, per their original plan.

“He saw your face,” Rath whispered.

Paisen smiled. “Charl?” she called, in Dasi’s voice. “Tell them to stop shooting!”

There was a prolonged, whispered argument from the top of the stairs, and then Lizelle called out again.

“Dasi, my men are understandably nervous right now. Can you come up here, please?”

“Slowly,” one of the bodyguards yelled, “with your hands where we can see them.”

“I’m not alone,” Paisen called. She motioned for Beauceron and Dasi to climb the stairs.

“Who else is there?” Lizelle asked.

“Friends. The people who rescued me from Fusoria.”

Paisen shifted her face back into one of her non-descript cover identities, and then tapped Dasi on the chest.

“You take it from here,” she whispered.

Wide-eyed, Dasi stood up and hesitantly peeked over the landing. She saw Lizelle standing behind one of the Senate Guards, his face a mixture of relief and fear. Farther down the hall, another body lay face down; a backpack sat next to it.

“Come all the way up,” the guard ordered, keeping his pistol pointed at her.

Dasi glanced briefly back at Paisen, and then finished climbing the stairs, stopping partway down the hall.

“Test her, sir,” the bodyguard said.

“Dasi,” Lizelle said. “I need to know you are who you say you are. When we were here last, I told you about something my mother called ‘God’s pinball machine.’ Do you remember what that was?”

“Lightning,” Dasi said, without hesitating. “We were out on the balcony having a drink—”

But Lizelle had already pushed past the guard – he grabbed Dasi and hugged her hard.

“My god, Dasi … they told me you were dead,” the senator said. “And then they attacked me! Here, in my own home.”

“Who did?” Paisen asked, stepping onto the landing.

15

Paisen moved slowly, and kept her rifle pointed harmlessly at the floor.

“Sir,” the guard warned Lizelle, shifting his aim to cover Paisen. “Get back behind me, sir.”

Lizelle let go of Dasi and stepped back, but stayed in the hall. Carefully, Beauceron and Rath joined Paisen on the landing. The senator studied them each in turn.

“I presume you are the three persons responsible for the attack on Fusoria?” Lizelle asked. “In that much, at least, it seems the Group has been honest with me.”

“Who attacked you?” Paisen repeated.

“The Janus Group, of course,” Lizelle told her.

“Why?” Rath asked.

“Because the director of the Group has ambitions to expand the organization well beyond what it was originally intended to be. And I dared to oppose her.”

“So it’s true,” Beauceron said, “the Guild is a Senate-sanctioned organization.” He shook his head in chagrin. “How can you justify cooperating with them?”

“Cooperating?” Lizelle asked. “No, Detective. The Senate established the Guild.”

“What? Why?” Beauceron asked.

“To save lives. To save humankind from itself,” Lizelle said.

“I don’t ….” Beauceron shook his head in disbelief. “How could the Guild possibly be considered a force for good?”

“Are you sure you want to know?” Lizelle asked. “It’s not an easy truth to hear.”

“I think we deserve to know,” Beauceron said.

“Very well. Years ago, a handful of pragmatic senators realized that the Federacy and Interstellar Police were inadequate in maintaining peace and order. They were trying to fight crime and terrorism with both hands tied behind their backs … while the terrorists and criminals followed no moral code, and were willing to resort to any means necessary. Those founding fathers realized that a small, secretive organization could be applied, like a scalpel, to the tumors that are bound to arise in every society.”

Beauceron scowled. “An organization of killers, executing citizens – innocent people – without due process, under the orders of the very people who were sworn to represent them.”

Lizelle nodded. “It’s morally reprehensible. But it works.”

Beauceron opened his mouth to protest, and then shut it.

“It’s true,” Lizelle continued. “You benefit from it without even realizing it. Answer me this: what happened almost immediately after humankind had settled the known planets?”

“The Colonial Wars,” Rath answered.

“Correct. The planets went to war over resources and territory in the First Colonial War. So we founded the Senate, in order to resolve disputes between planets diplomatically. And after the Second Colonial War, the Interstellar Police were established to enforce the laws impartially.”

“It didn’t work,” Rath told him.

“It almost worked. But it still wasn’t foolproof. A veteran policeman went back home on leave, and was reminded of the injustices that still existed on his home planet.”

“Anders Ricken,” Beauceron said.

“Yes. Anders saw a rather draconian government in power, he saw his own family suffering under that oppression, and decided to use his power and position to try to bring that dictatorship down. And in the process, he inspired like-minded police on several other worlds to challenge their own governments. They were good, smart people – idealists who just took their police training to its logical conclusion. They saw injustice and wanted to help the citizens of their worlds, and so they fought to free them. It was the longest of the Colonial Wars, and the bloodiest. And how did it end?”

“With the establishment of the Internal Affairs bureau,” Beauceron said.

“No,” Rath said, shaking his head. “I studied this, years ago. There was already an Internal Affairs division, but they couldn’t pin anything illegal on Anders for months, and by that time the rebellion had already spread too far.”

“That’s true,” Lizelle agreed. “The conflict was on the verge of ending several times, but Anders always managed to rekindle it. As long as he lived, so did the revolution. A small group of senators realized this, so they found an experienced hitman in prison, freed him, and sent him to kill Anders. ‘The First Contractor,’ you might call him. Those three senators learned two lessons from that. They learned that you can end a war – and by extension, prevent one – by killing a single man. But they also learned that mere criminals lacked the subtlety they required. Killing Anders so dramatically had made a martyr of him. What they should have done was simply made him disappear. Then his followers would not have known whether he died or merely abandoned the cause and fled. No body, no martyr. And from that final lesson, the Janus Group was born.”

“Kill one, save millions?” Rath asked.

“No. Save billions.” Lizelle gestured at Beauceron and Rath. “The two of you are opposing sides to the same coin. Detective, you are sworn to protect and serve – the sheepdog, if you will. But when you fight the wolves, you have to play by the sheep’s rules – and they constrain you. We needed our own wolves. An organization outside of the rules, by its very definition and composition. But it serves the same purpose as law enforcement does – to maintain the peace.”

“I wasn’t killing people like Anders,” Rath argued, “they weren’t enemies of the government. My contracts were from jilted husbands and criminal organizations trying to silence witnesses.”

“Most of them probably were. Assignments like that ensure that the Group remains self-funded, so that tax-payer dollars aren’t required to keep it in operation.”

“But war still happens,” Rath insisted. “I was nearly killed on Jokuan trying to escape a battle, and thousands more died in that city.”

“You were the asset on Jokuan?” Lizelle asked. “Interesting – the galaxy truly is a small place. You did prevent a war, you just didn’t know it. Your target was waiting for transport off-world, where he planned to broker an alliance between Jokuan’s rebels and factions on other planets. That localized conflict could have spread and become a full-blown interplanetary war out in the Territories. But no war broke out, in large part due to our decision to send you there, and your successful prosecution of that mission.”

Paisen cleared her throat. “You’re defending an organization that just tried to kill you.”

“I am,” Lizelle said, turning to face her. “I misjudged the director – she’s a ruthless woman who has forgotten her place, and lost sight of the fact that the Group exists to serve the government, not its own fiscal aims. The Group remains a crucial weapon, it has simply fallen into the wrong hands. It’s critical that she be … removed. But the Group will remain, and continue its mission, for the good of the galaxy.”

“How can you defend them at all, when they killed Khyron?” Dasi asked, a tear rolling down her cheek.

Lizelle was taken aback; in his fervor, he had nearly forgotten about Dasi.

“Dasi, you have to understand … it’s for the greater good.”

Dasi looked at him in horror.

“At what cost?” Rath asked quietly.

“We know the cost,” Beauceron spat. “At the cost of countless innocent lives.”

“And the lives of the contractors,” Paisen pointed out. “But either way, I’ve had enough of this philosophical debate. Tell us where to find this director, Senator, and I’ll kill her myself.”

Lizelle studied her. “And when she’s dead?”

“I take my money and disappear. You can do what you want with the Group, I don’t care.”

Lizelle considered her offer for several seconds. Then he sighed.

“There are three of us on the Senate committee. For our safety, our identities are hidden from the Group, and each of us is entrusted with a different secret of the Group. That way, should the Group seek to eliminate the Senate oversight committee, the surviving members know enough to expose the Group, or dismantle it completely, if necessary. But individually, we don’t know enough to bring it down, without the consent of our peers. I know the name of the family that runs the Group in stewardship for us. My colleagues know the location of Group Headquarters, and the access codes to Group financial systems.”

“So tell me her name,” Paisen said.

“Siya Nkosi,” Lizelle replied.

Beauceron caught one of the Senate Guards glancing subconsciously back at the body on the floor. The guard and Beauceron locked eyes for a second, and then the guard looked away, hurriedly. Beauceron frowned.

“… but Nkosi will take precautions as soon as she hears I survived the attack,” Lizelle was saying. “She will anticipate me sending someone for her. She’ll go to ground.”

“Where?”

“Group Headquarters. You’ll need to talk to the other senators to find out where it is.”

“Which senator knows where the Group is headquartered?” Rath asked.

“I don’t know – we keep it a secret who knows what. You’ll need to see both of them.”

“Fine,” Paisen agreed. “So who are they?”

Lizelle hesitated.

“You have to understand, their identities … it’s perhaps the most dangerous secret in the galaxy. I’ve spent my life protecting it. I suspect I’m still alive because Nkosi hoped to capture me, and torture me for their identities, so she could eliminate them next. I was prepared to take my own life to keep them secret. If Nkosi were to ever learn it … there would be nothing stopping her from murdering us all, and turning the Group into her own private army.”

“I can keep a secret,” Paisen assured him.

“Can you? Will you give me your word that the secret dies with you?”

“Yes,” Paisen agreed.

“The word of an assassin.” Lizelle smiled ruefully, shaking his head. “I think we need something a bit more reliable. How about this: once you find and kill Nkosi, I will make sure you’re paid what you are owed. You and your friend,” he pointed at Rath. “And I’ll ensure they stop hunting all of you. That will be the end of it.”

“Deal,” Paisen agreed. “Nkosi’s head, in return for our money and safety. Now tell us who the other senators are.”

“Paisen,” Beauceron said. “I don’t think—”

“Martin, this deal doesn’t concern you,” she interrupted. “I never agreed to help you expose the Group. You’re on your own for that.”

Beauceron eyed the two Senate Guards. “In that case, I don’t think we should all know the identity of the other senators.” With exaggerated care, he drew his notebook from his pocket, slowly showing it to the bodyguards. “I’m going to bring this pencil and paper to the senator, so he can write down their names and share them with my colleague,” he told them.

Beauceron walked slowly across the room. As he moved, he took a longer look at the body down the hallway, but he could see little of it, aside from the backpack next to it. When he neared Lizelle, Beauceron held out the notebook, but it slipped from his hand, tumbling to the floor.

“Sorry,” Beauceron said, stooping down to pick it up. He handed it to the senator and then backed away, hands in the air. The bodyguards watched him closely.

Rath caught a glimpse of something on the floor, where Beauceron had dropped the notebook. He zoomed in using his eye implants, and saw a small metal disc with the letter B painted on it. Rath glanced sideways at Beauceron.

What the hell are you playing at, Martin?

Lizelle scribbled in the notebook, tore out a page, and then walked over to Paisen.

“Do we have a deal?” he asked.

“Yes, sir,” she agreed.

He held out the paper, and she took it. All eyes were on Paisen as she unfolded the paper and silently read the names, but Rath’s expanded peripheral vision caught movement, and he looked over to see the body down the hallway push itself up from the floor. He brought his rifle up, an incoherent scream of warning on his lips, but the bodyguards were already firing, stun rounds punching into both Rath and Paisen.

Rath spasmed in agony, and fell to the floor. Moments later, he felt the auto-rifle wrenched from his grasp, and someone pulled him to his knees. The painful shocks stopped.

“Hands on your head,” a voice ordered. Rath took a deep breath and complied.

The two Senate Guards stood a safe distance away, covering him and Paisen with their auto-rifles. Dasi and Beauceron were kneeling as well.

“What have you done?” Senator Lizelle demanded. “I didn’t order this.”

The guard closest to Lizelle swung back his rifle and clubbed the senator once, brutally, in the stomach, knocking him to the floor. Rath watched as the two bodyguards shifted their faces and hair, slipping back into non-descript cover identities.

Contractors.

His stomach dropped. Then the third man, who had lain as if dead on the floor, shouldered his backpack and joined the other two. His face was a mass of burn scars, and his eyes glinted cruelly as he eyed his five prisoners. They lingered on Rath the longest.

16

“Hello, everyone,” 700 said, standing over his kneeling prisoners. “I’m 700, this is 816 and 902. Gentlemen, well done,” 700 congratulated them, then turned back to his prisoners. “They replaced Senator Lizelle’s security detail just before I launched my attack on the house.”

Lizelle groaned and sat up, coughing. “Nkosi sent you.”

“She did,” 700 affirmed. “And she predicted that you would betray her and the Group. For that, sir, you will die. But first let me thank you – all of you – for playing your parts so perfectly.”

He stooped and picked up the folded piece of paper that contained the two senator’s names. 700 glanced at it, then tucked it into his pocket.

“Senators Mastic and Blackwell. Fascinating. I have my doubts as to whether you really would have died before revealing their names,” 700 told Lizelle. “But compared to torturing you, this way was much easier.”

“Nkosi is going to have them killed,” Beauceron said. “That was the plan all along – get the senator to reveal their identities, then assassinate them, so the Group could operate without constraints.”

“Correct. For your part, Detective, you might have the luxury of dying now, and quickly.” He turned to Rath and Paisen. “But you two do not. You two go back on the tables. Do you remember the contractor they tortured? We talked about him before, 621 – the one from the video they showed us at the end of Training?”

“I remember,” Rath said.

“Do you know how long he lived?” 700 asked. “I asked them, because I was curious. One hundred and ninety-four days. They tortured him for six months straight. Every day. Wake up, torture. Stop after twelve hours, heal through the night, then do it all over again. A hundred and ninety-four times. Just think: every day when he woke up, there must have been a moment when he realized that it wasn’t a nightmare: it was real. It was going to happen, all over again.”

Rath glanced across at Paisen: like him, she had her hands interlocked behind her head. But he could just make out her finger resting near the button on her detonator bracelet. He caught her eye, and shook his head.

“That’s not going to happen to us,” Rath told 700.

“It will,” 700 assured him. “And you’ll know pain far worse than the pain you inflicted on me, 621. The only question is: how long will you last? Do you know why they stopped, why they decided to kill him on the last day?”

“No,” Rath said.

“Because he stopped reacting. On the hundred and ninety-fourth day, he didn’t make a sound. They cut him open, they broke his bones, they burned him, electrocuted him – he didn’t whimper, or beg, or cry … nothing. The theory is that he had a complete mental break. As a self-defense mechanism, his mind just stopped registering the pain. So they killed him. What’s the point of continuing to torture someone who doesn’t feel it?”

700 squatted in front of Rath, putting his fire-ravaged face just inches from Rath’s own. “But I have a different theory, 621. I watched the tape of that last day, and I saw him flinch. Just once, just for the briefest of instants. But I know: he could feel what was happening. I don’t think he had a mental break, I think he had a moment of complete clarity. When he woke up that morning, he realized that the only way to make them stop was to convince them that it no longer hurt. Can you imagine the discipline that took? But you, Rath Kaldirim? I don’t see that strength in you.”

“Let’s find out,” Rath proposed. “You and me, right now.”

700 laughed. “No.”

“Scared?” Rath asked.

“Not in the slightest. You wouldn’t be lucky enough to get the drop on me twice, and we both know it. That’s why I can hear your heartbeat pounding already. You just want me to kill you quickly and painlessly. And I won’t.”

700 spied Beauceron’s pencil on the floor – it had fallen out of the detective’s notebook when the contractors forced him to kneel. Absent-mindedly, the scarred contractor knelt and picked it up.

“You know they’ll kill you when you reach fifty kills,” Paisen told him.

Rath hung his head. “I told him the last time we met. He doesn’t care.”

Paisen shifted her attention to the other two contractors. “Did you know that?” she asked.

“Yes, I told them,” 700 answered. “They’re both getting fully paid out at the end of this mission, before they complete their fifty kills. A special exemption, approved by the director herself.” He twirled Beauceron’s pencil through his fingers, looping it back and forth.

“Nkosi won’t honor that deal,” Paisen told them. “Not with all that you know about Group operations and oversight. You’re too dangerous.”

The contractor on the right looked at Paisen. “What do you suggest we do instead?”

“Kill this psychopath and join us, and we’ll ensure you get your cut,” she said.

The contractor shook his head. “I’ll take my chances with Nkosi’s deal.”

Beauceron’s eyes were fixed on his pencil, twirling in 700’s hand.

I’ve seen that before …

“Colony A31!” he shouted.

700 fixed him with a surprised stare, an eyebrow cocked. “What?”

“The children at the carnival … Colony A31. You were the one that killed them! And Mehta, too.”

A slow smile spread across 700’s face. “I did. You investigated those missions? What an odd coincidence.” He tapped Dasi on the forehead with the pencil. “I’ll be killing you, and I killed your boyfriend, too. We’re just surrounded by coincidences.”

“700,” one of the other contractors grumbled. “Enough playing – we need to report in.”

“We do,” 700 agreed, standing back.

He drew an auto-pistol from a belt holster. Dasi whimpered.

Beauceron’s mind raced. “When we arrived here, you weren’t jamming our signals – you were jamming the airship’s security system. Preventing it from notifying Interstellar Police of the attack, so that you could lay your trap undisturbed.”

“And?” 700 asked.

“You’re still jamming now,” Beauceron said, pointing his chin at 700’s backpack. “It’s in there, isn’t it? So your Headquarters hasn’t seen or heard what’s happened here. The only people that know the names of those senators are here in this room.”

“Not for long,” 700 told him. He reached into the pack and switched the jammer off. “I’ll tell them in a second. But first, the director has asked to see the senator die.”

Rath shot Beauceron a look of alarm.

“Martin—”

But Beauceron had already pressed the button on his detonator bracelet. Behind the contractors, the metal disc he had dropped on the floor flashed white-hot, then exploded with massive force.

17

Paisen came to first, her hemobots automatically administering a dose of adrenaline and jolting her into consciousness. She pushed a pile of broken bannister off her leg, and rolled to one side, coughing. She realized she had been knocked off the landing, and ended up on the lower floor. Rath lay next to her, and she spotted Beauceron and Dasi above them on the stairs. There was no sign of Lizelle or the other contractors.

God damn it, Beauceron!

She stood unsteadily and walked to the stairs, where she found an auto-rifle lying on a step. She dimly recognized it as Rath’s, but she picked it up, and checked that the weapon was still loaded. Then she started up the stairs. She stepped over Beauceron and Dasi’s inert bodies – they looked unhurt, but she had no time to stop and check.

The top of the stairs was a blood-soaked mess. Paisen panned her rifle across the landing, and noted that the two contractors had taken the brunt of the blast; little of them remained. Senator Lizelle’s body had been flung down the hall. A movement caught Paisen’s eye, and she switched aim, firing reflexively. But 700 dove out of the hallway in time, disappearing into one of the side rooms.

Shit. He must have been shielded by the other contractors, like we were.

She dashed after him, sprinting across the hall and into the room beyond. A pair of doors at the far end of the room stood empty, opening out onto a balcony. She looked around frantically, but the room appeared empty, too.

Where the hell did he go?

Paisen heard the whine of a hoverbike starting up and she realized with sudden clarity that the open balcony doors she was staring at were a mere hologram. She kicked aside the projector, disrupting the illusion. The real doors were locked shut. With a burst from her auto-rifle, she blasted away the door handle, then pushed out onto the balcony, but the hoverbike’s engine noise was already fading as 700 disappeared into Emerist’s thick clouds. She shouldered the rifle and fired a salvo after him, snarling.

Fuck!

Dasi and Beauceron were regaining consciousness when she returned. Paisen checked both quickly, finding shrapnel wounds, but nothing life-threatening. She realized she had several pieces of shrapnel of her own to deal with, but after a quick consult with her hemobots, chose to ignore them.

Rath was far worse off. She pushed debris off of him, and saw that the force of the explosion had broken several ribs. His Forge, still slung over one shoulder, leaked fluids out of three large shrapnel holes.

“Rath, get up,” she told him, shaking him lightly by the shoulder.

“Ouch,” he told her, his eyes fluttering open. He winced. “Quit shaking me, that’s not helping.”

She pulled him over to the stairs, then set his auto-rifle on his lap, spying her own weapon lying off to the side.

“700’s gone; the other two are dead,” she told him. “Dasi and Beauceron are right here, I’m going to check the senator.”

“Roger,” Rath said. He set his hand on the rifle. “Go find him.”

Lizelle lay face down on the floor; when Paisen turned him over, she knew at once that his injuries had been fatal. She checked for a pulse for ten seconds, just to be sure, then returned to the stairs. Beauceron was kneeling next to Dasi, applying a bandage to a cut on her hip.

“How’s Lizelle?” he asked.

“Dead,” Paisen informed him. “What the hell were you thinking?”

Rath spat grime and dust out of his mouth. “He was thinking that if we all died, Nkosi would never learn the identity of the other two senators.”

“True,” Beauceron commented. “I’m sorry it didn’t work how I planned.”

“Next time you decide to make a martyr of me, run it by me first, huh?” Paisen commented.

“Well, we’re too late now,” Dasi noted. “That man will have told the Group who the other senators are, and they’ll be going after them. They’ll kill them before we can warn them.”

“No,” Beauceron shook his head. “Not necessarily. The airship’s security system is back online – Interstellar Police are probably en route right now. When they get here, we can tell them what happened to Lizelle, and warn the other senators.”

“Oh, Christ,” Paisen swore. She keyed her radio. “Mikolos, this is Paisen, over. Requesting immediate pickup on the senator’s airship.”

“Martin,” Rath explained, “that won’t work. If we stay here, IP is just going to think we’re the ones that attacked and killed Lizelle.”

“Technically, Beauceron did kill Lizelle,” Paisen pointed out.

“That’s true,” Beauceron admitted. “But the evidence will exonerate us – our lives were at stake. And it’s our responsibility to make sure the other senators are warned.”

“You’re welcome to stay here and talk to the authorities,” Paisen told him. “But our only realistic shot of warning them is to get to Anchorpoint before the Group does.” She pulled Dasi to her feet, supporting the younger woman with an arm around her waist. They climbed down the stairs, past Rath and Beauceron, and started down the hall. “Come on,” Paisen said.

Beauceron helped Rath stand up. As the two men turned, Rath glanced out the window. Two armored air cars hovered outside the main entrance to the house – Rath was surprised that the Interstellar Police had arrived so soon. Then he saw a group of armed men climb out of the cars, and noted that none of the cars bore IP insignia.

“Oh, shit,” he commented.

Paisen and Dasi turned. “What?”

“The Group just dropped off about a dozen contractors on the front lawn, headed inside.”

The air cars rose up on their hoverjets and flew along the front of the house, scanning with their sensors.

“Get down!” Rath warned, as the nearest car’s cannon opened fire, rounds smashing through the window and chewing into the woodwork of the hall. Rath and Beauceron scrambled up the staircase, while Paisen and Dasi sprinted down the hall on the floor below. The cannon fire stopped.

“Rath, where are you?” Paisen radioed.

“Back upstairs,” he responded. He and Beauceron had paused to catch their breath in what looked like a living room off of the main hallway.

“We’re a floor below you,” Paisen told him. “Dasi says there’s another set of stairs in the rear, meet us there.”

“Roger,” Rath said. “On our way.”

Rath saw an auto-pistol on the floor next to a dead Senate Guard, and handed his rifle to Beauceron. “It’s loaded, safety off. My ribs are killing me, so I’m going to be better off with a pistol,” he told the detective.

“Okay,” Beauceron said.

The two men hurried out into a second hallway; when they reached the end of it, they found a wall with a window, but no stairs.

“Shit,” Rath said. “Stairs must be in the first hallway.” He heard a burst of gunfire from below, followed by a muffled explosion.

“Contractors are inside the building,” Paisen warned over the radio. “I took down two, but we had to break contact. Dasi and I are descending to sub-basement levels.”

“Roger,” Rath called.

“This is Mikolos,” the captain radioed. “I’m standing off two miles west of the airship. That airspace is looking a bit unfriendly right now.”

“You’re armed, too,” Rath pointed out.

“I am, but those air cars are far more maneuverable than the Hurasu in atmospheric flight,” he pointed out. “And they outnumber me.”

Rath and Beauceron found their way back to the first hallway, but one of the air cars was hovering with its cannon pointed straight down the hall, and the instant they emerged from the side passage, a hail of bullets forced them back into cover.

“Rath, we’re in the senator’s garage,” Paisen told him. “If Mikolos won’t come to us, we can try something else. Where are you?”

Rath leaned against the wall, wincing as the cannon rounds sent splinters of wood flying. “We’re pinned down up here, still haven’t made it to the back stairs. And the rest of those contractors are between us and you … I don’t think we’re going to make it.”

“Stand by,” Paisen said. “We’re getting in an air car, we’re going to try and pick you up.”

“No,” Rath told her. “You can’t risk it. Get airborne and head for the Hurasu. We’ll try to give you some cover from up here.”

“That’s a shitty plan, Rath,” she replied.

“It’s a shitty situation. Get to the senators before the Group does, warn them, and get our money. We’ll figure out another way out of here.”

“Paisen, I backed up all of the evidence we’ve collected so far on the Group to Hurasu’s hard drives,” Beauceron said, keying his throat-mic. “Make sure it gets in the right hands.”

“I will if I can,” she replied.

Abruptly, the cannon stopped firing, and Rath saw two grenades land on the floor of the hallway. He and Beauceron jumped back into the living room, and slammed the door shut.

“Contractors are coming up,” Rath said, unnecessarily.

The grenades exploded in quick succession. Rath pulled the door back open and steadied his pistol on the door frame. He watched as the barrel of a rifle poked past the edge of the stairs, then swung around the corner toward him.

He’s using the rifle’s optics to see around the corner without exposing himself. Just like they taught us in Training.

Rath fired twice, and saw one bullet connect with the weapon’s magazine, detonating several of the rounds within. Rath heard a cry of pain and saw the weapon fall to the floor.

“Martin, switch out with me,” Rath ordered.

Beauceron took Rath’s place at the door, his auto-rifle trained on the top of the stairs. “What are you going to do?”

“There’s another room on the far side of the hall – I’m going to cross over and get that air car’s attention.”

Another rifle poked around the corner in their direction, this time opening fire immediately. Beauceron returned fire.

“You okay?” Rath asked.

“Yeah,” Beauceron replied. “They didn’t hit me.”

“Shoot at him again,” Rath told him, and then ran across the hall, smashing through a closed door with his full weight. A white-hot jolt of pain seared through his ribs. The air car was hovering just outside the windows, and Rath saw it spin on its axis as the pilot saw him, lining up the car’s cannon. Rath slid across the floor, flattening himself against the outer wall as bullets crashed through the window above him. Then the car shifted left, searching for a better angle, blasting out the room’s other window as it opened fire again.

Rath set his auto-pistol on the floor and pulled the metal disc from his chest pocket.

“Martin!”

“Yes!”

“Set your bracelet to my dial setting.”

“Done,” the detective reported. Rath heard him squeeze off several rounds toward the top of the stairs.

“Okay, on the count of three, trigger it.”

“Ready.”

“One, two, three, NOW!”

Rath stood and faced the window frame, found the air car, and flicked the disc at it side-arm. He saw the cannon open fire again, and the disc bounce off the car’s windshield, before he ducked down, covering his face.

BOOM!

A twisted hunk of burning metal spun through the window over Rath’s head, and he heard pieces of the car rattle against the side of the house. A quick glimpse over the window sill showed him the car’s fiery wreckage tumbling to the ground.

“Paisen!” Rath grabbed his auto-pistol and saw the second air car swing into view farther away. Rath fired several rounds at it to get its attention.

“Standing by,” she replied.

“You got your distraction. Go!”

“Roger,” she called. “Thanks.”

Before the second air car could return fire, Rath dashed back across the hall and handed Beauceron another magazine.

“Thank you,” Beauceron said, taking a second to reload. “What now?”

Rath slid the magazine out of his auto-pistol, counting the remaining bullets.

Four, plus one in the chamber.

He looked at Beauceron, but had to duck as the contractor on the stairs fired another burst in their direction.

“Fall back, and hope for a miracle.”

* * *

In the garage, Paisen finished keying in the manual override code for Senator Lizelle’s convertible air car and then glanced quickly over the car’s dashboard. She counted four different contractors spread out across the garage, searching for them.

“Stay down,” she whispered to Dasi. “They’re gonna start shooting in a second.”

Dasi nodded and forced herself lower into the passenger seat. Paisen took a deep breath, and then turned the car on. She immediately jammed her foot on the accelerator, pinning it to the floor. The car roared forward, and Paisen risked a brief look over the dash to make sure they were still pointed at the garage’s exit. The windshield spider-webbed as multiple rounds impacted, and the car bucked as an unlucky contractor failed to move out of the way in time. He was thrown to the side and Paisen saw his lifeless form smash into another parked vehicle. Then they were out and free, open air on all sides. She jerked the wheel to the side, flying west and putting several hundred meters of distance behind them before sitting up.

“We’re clear,” she called to Dasi. “Hurasu, we are inbound at high speed, I need the cargo bay open and ready for us.”

“Roger,” Mikolos responded. “I see you.”

Paisen saw the yellow ship emerge from a bank of cloud. At the same instant, she saw the second air car appear in her rear view mirror, blasting after her in pursuit.

“Shit. Turn around, Mikolos! We’re going to land in the aft cargo bay.”

“In a second,” the captain replied. Suddenly, a missile tore out of a port in the Hurasu’s belly. The enemy air car dodged aside nimbly to evade the missile, but it beat a hasty retreat, disappearing into a nearby cloud. Paisen flew over the Hurasu’s hull, banking before lining them up, and then setting down hard in the ship’s cargo bay.

“We’re on board, go go go!”

Mikolos closed the bay doors, and Paisen heard the ship’s main engines light – the sudden acceleration caused the senator’s air car to slide to the rear of the ship, smashing into the doors with an audible crunch. Paisen activated the car’s clamp, locking them in place before they could slide any more. Then she hopped out, and ran for the cockpit.

Mikolos glanced at her when she entered, but his eyes quickly returned to the controls. “They’re firing missiles at us,” he noted. “We’ll out-run them: I have the engines at max power.”

Panting, Dasi joined them, and took a seat next to Paisen.

“Any other aircraft in pursuit?” Paisen asked.

“No. There’s a lot of radio traffic about the senator’s airship, though. Interstellar Police are all in an uproar.”

“We can’t go back for Rath and Martin?” Dasi asked.

Mikolos gave a curt shake of his head. “No.”

“How does our escape vector look?” Paisen asked.

Mikolos checked his computer. “Crowded. Interstellar Police will have craft launching from the orbital transfer station on intercept routes, but … they’re above the other hemisphere, so if we ignore traffic control routes and just head for deep space, we should make it to FTL before they can converge.”

“Okay,” Paisen said. She patted his arm. “Thanks for the assist back there.”

Mikolos cocked an eyebrow. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to invoke the ‘dangerous circumstances’ surcharge clauses in our contract.”

“Yeah, I know,” Paisen told him. “Rath, this is Paisen, over.”

She waited several seconds.

“Rath this is Paisen: we’ll be clear in a few minutes. If you can find your way out of there and get off-planet, I’ll update you on our progress – check your encrypted messages.”

Dasi gave Paisen a worried look. “Martin,” Dasi tried. “You’re going to meet us at Anchorpoint, right? You’ll find a way to get out of there?”

There was no reply.

Paisen grimaced, then saw Dasi’s expression. “They’re probably just too busy to respond right now. Firefights can get like that.”

“Are they going to make it out?” Dasi asked.

Paisen stared out the canopy, where the last of Emerist’s atmosphere was quickly slipping away to reveal the star field beyond.

“I don’t know.”

18

“Captain, you better join us for this,” Paisen told Mikolos. He shut off the arc welder and set it aside, his repairs to the Hurasu’s cargo bay doors nearly complete. Paisen led him to the lounge, where he took a seat across from Dasi at the table, and steepled his hands carefully on the table.

“I’m listening.”

“When I hired you, I told you that it was in your best interest to remain ignorant of us and our plans. I think, however, the situation has changed, and you deserve to know what you’re getting into.” She cleared her throat. “Rath and I were contractors in the Guild,” she told him.

“I presumed as much.”

“We’re attempting to trace the Guild’s headquarters, in order to force them to give us the money they owe us. To find them, I need to locate two senators on Anchorpoint, before the Guild has them assassinated.”

If Mikolos was surprised, he hid it well.

Paisen toggled on the table’s hologram projector, and a lifelike image of a well-dressed man appeared. “This is Senator Artem Blackwell.”

Dasi spoke up. “He’s a Neo-Progressive from the planet Fiet, an up-and-comer, he surprised a lot of people by beating out a well-liked incumbent. He won a seat on the Senate Judiciary Committee a few years back, if my memory’s not wrong.”

“And Senator Libba Mastic,” Paisen said.

“Thirty-year veteran of the Senate,” Dasi filled in. “She’s been around forever, and probably has the I.O.U.s to prove it. She’s got serious clout, right up there with Lizelle. She chairs the Budget Committee.”

“Between them, Blackwell and Mastic know where the Guild is located, and how to access its financial accounts,” Paisen said. “Given Mastic is on the Budget Committee, I think it’s likely she’s the one that knows where the money is stashed, and Blackwell knows the location of Headquarters. So I’m going after Mastic first … if we can convince her to pay us out, that’ll be the end of it.”

“But we promised Beauceron we’d get his evidence to the police,” Dasi pointed out.

“After we get paid,” Paisen replied. She turned to Mikolos. “I’m aware that the money I paid you for this charter will run out when we arrive at Anchorpoint … but I expect I’m going to need your services past that point.”

Mikolos cocked an eyebrow, and pushed a stray dreadlock back out of his face. “I don’t typically fly passengers pro bono.”

“I bet you don’t typically help passengers escape from the scene of a senator’s assassination, either.”

“Police investigations tend to be bad for business,” he agreed.

“Anchorpoint might be a similar deal,” Paisen told him. “If we’re lucky, then I find Mastic, warn her, get our money, and we get the hell out of there. But if the Guild is at Anchorpoint, it could go down worse than Emerist. I’m not intending to kill anyone, but I may have to. And there are plenty of folks out there that want me – and Dasi – dead.”

“I could get arrested or killed, and you don’t have any money left to pay me for my trouble,” Mikolos summarized.

Paisen held up the grey counter bracelet on her wrist and pressed the button, letting Dasi and Mikolos see the spinning golden 50 hologram. “The Guild owes me one hundred and sixty-four million dollars. I intend to take that from them, along with the money they owe Rath. If you help me see this through to the end, I’ll give you a five percent cut of our total earnings. That’s at least eight million dollars.”

Mikolos sat forward, and put his palms flat on the table. “Ten percent.”

“Seven,” Paisen countered.

“Seven, plus any damages to the Hurasu.”

“Done,” Paisen agreed. She held out her hand. Mikolos stood and took it.

* * *

The briefing room door slid open, and Director Nkosi stepped inside. As silence settled over the room, she walked down the rows of stadium seats and took a chair in the first row. She eyed Feykin.

“When you’re ready,” she told him.

The Chief of Operations gestured to a large viewscreen, where a star-map appeared, showing Anchorpoint at its center.

“Operation Severance. Assets are still gathering, but we expect to have nearly twenty contractors at Anchorpoint by midnight local time. They’ll be split into three teams, one for each senator, plus a reserve element. Each main team will mimic one senator and their security detail. Team One will pose as Senator Mastic and her Senate Guards, while Team Two will mimic Blackwell and his protective detail. The teams will position themselves near the senators’ offices and wait for our signal.”

He zoomed in on Anchorpoint, pulling up an internal map of the senate office complex. “Here are their staging areas, for reference. Once they’re set, Director, you’ll initiate an emergency conference call with the senators to share an update on Emerist and Senator Lizelle.”

“What is the latest on that?” Nkosi asked.

Feykin pointed at Altaras, who stood. “Ma’am, Interstellar Police are putting together a search mission aimed at locating the airship’s wreckage. After 700 remote-detonated the airship’s engines, it fell several miles through the atmosphere and then crashed into the surface. Emerist is mostly gaseous, but it does have a rocky core. However, their chances of finding anything are low – atmospheric gases near the core block practically all types of sensors, and the gases are highly toxic, which limits the time any ship can spend searching.”

“And what of the rumor that Lizelle made it off the airship?”

“Just a rumor, ma’am. We double-checked 700’s recording of the operation, the senator was definitely killed by the explosion.”

“Thank you, Supervisor,” the director told him. She turned back to Feykin.

“Nevertheless,” the Chief of Operations continued, “the incident will undoubtedly have Mastic and Blackwell on edge, and their security details will be on alert. That’s why the timing of this is critical – the two teams must be perfectly synchronized.”

He gestured at the screen again, and a flowchart appeared. “Here’s the order of events. Assets rendezvous at release points and report readiness. Director, you then initiate the conference call. Once you’ve shared the news with them and they’ve discussed it, we’ll pretend to disconnect the call on our end. But we’ll actually be splitting the call at that point, and connecting each senator with a voice mimic posing as the other senator. That mimic will then suggest that the senators link up in private to discuss the developments on Emerist – the end result being that each senator will believe the other senator is en route to their offices.”

“Then you release the teams at Anchorpoint,” Nkosi guessed.

“Yes, ma’am. Team One will gain entry to Senator Blackwell’s offices, and the contractor posing as Senator Mastic will attempt to get Blackwell alone, in order to carry out the mission. She eliminates Blackwell, and ideally, exits without alerting his bodyguards. Meanwhile, Team Two is using the same subterfuge at Senator Mastic’s office.”

“I’m following,” Nkosi told him. “What about contingency plans?”

Feykin pointed at the screen, and a third dot appeared. “Contractor 700 will lead a four-man reserve team, they’ll be located midway between the two senators’ offices. Now, we’ll be unable to monitor the operations once they leave the public areas outside – Senate Security blocks all communications that aren’t through official channels, and we haven’t been able to figure out a work-around for that. So if the reserve element is needed, the contractors on scene will need to send a team member back out of the office to call for help. At that point, the reserve team will move in and assist.”

Nkosi frowned. “If the reserve element is needed, other security forces on Anchorpoint will have been alerted, presumably. They’ll be headed to the scene as well.”

“Yes, ma’am. The reserve team also has responsibility for positioning explosive penetrators at key locations in this section of the complex. They’ll be monitoring emergency nets: as soon as a call goes out, they’ll trigger the explosives. The resulting hull breaches and loss of atmosphere will cause internal hatches to seal automatically, effectively isolating this entire office wing, including the offices of Mastic and Blackwell. The Senate Guards have vacuum training and equipment, but by our estimate, it will take them at least thirty minutes to gain entry.”

“Exfiltration?” Nkosi asked.

“In an ideal scenario, teams merely exit their respective offices and then initiate a standard break contact drill – EMP grenades, change cover identities, and disperse.”

“And if their cover is blown?”

“Teams will overwhelm Senate Guards in each office, while keeping civilian staffers contained. They’ll use incendiary grenades to start a fire in the office, let the staffers begin evacuating, and blend in with them under cover of the smoke and fire.”

Nkosi drummed her fingers on her armrest, studying the diagram of Anchorpoint. Feykin held his breath. Finally, Nkosi nodded.

“The plan seems satisfactory. If you’ll all excuse us, I’d like a word in private with Mr. Feykin.”

The supervisors and techs filed out. Nkosi stared at the floor, lost in thought. When she heard the door to the room close, she eyed Feykin.

“Emerist,” she stated flatly.

“That was disappointing—” he began, but she cut him off with a single finger held in the air.

“Disappointing doesn’t even begin to cover it,” she observed. “After the fiasco on Fusoria, I’m beginning to suspect we have agents inside this organization who are aiding the rogue contractors.”

“Impossible,” Feykin told her. “We watch the staff too closely. I’ve personally audited everyone who came into contact with them.”

“Then perhaps I should be auditing you,” Nkosi suggested.

Feykin straightened up. “I have nothing to hide.”

“No? Regardless, they should have been dead months ago – years ago, in 339’s case. But instead, now they know my identity.”

“621 is likely dead, and the detective, too,” Feykin told her. “Footage from the contractors on the scene—”

“I am tired of hearing about fucking footage!” Nkosi thundered. “621 may be dead, but 339 is not. And because of that, I’ve spent the entire afternoon reviewing security procedures and relocation options for myself and my family. No more half measures, Feykin. Except for the teams at Anchorpoint, I want every active contractor pulled off their current assignment and redeployed to the most likely areas where 339 will turn up next. Until I can stand over her tortured body and watch the light fade from her eyes, you – and your entire operations team – are on warning. Don’t forget that you are entirely replaceable.”

The color drained from Feykin’s face. “Yes, ma’am. We’ll find her and bring her to you.”

“See that you do.”

19

Dasi turned out of the access tunnel, and joined the traffic heading for the Senate office areas. Beside her, Paisen checked their progress against a map of the battle cruiser’s interior, then set the datascroll back down.

She gestured to the wide roadway outside their car. “Strange to be driving inside a ship,” she commented. “This place is even more massive than I thought.”

“Mm,” Dasi replied. “You get used to it after a while. You start saying ‘outside’ and you really just mean the open spaces inside the ship, which are outside of the offices and living quarters.”

They passed a multi-story viewport, which showed them a view of the asteroid the ship was anchored to, and some of the space traffic flitting around the ship. Then the younger woman turned off the roadway and into a parking lot. She slid the ground car into a parking slot marked VISITOR and turned the car’s engine off. On impulse, Dasi picked up the datascroll from the car’s console, and tapped on the screen to refresh the news feed.

“Anything?” Paisen asked.

“No,” Dasi said. “No updates. The police on Emerist are still putting together a search team, but they aren’t optimistic that they’ll find any survivors.”

Paisen eyed the younger woman. “I’m not giving up hope yet,” she said. “And in any event, they would have wanted us to see this through.”

Dasi nodded silently.

“How do I look?” Paisen asked.

Dasi examined her closely. “Like me, I guess.”

Paisen checked her reflection in the side-view mirror a final time. “Okay, I’m going in.”

“Good luck,” Dasi told her.

“Mm,” Paisen grunted. “I’m going to need it. Normally I’d have studied you for longer before attempting something like this. You’re sure we won’t be able to stay in contact once I go inside?”

“No,” Dasi said. “Senate offices are shielded to block all non-official communications. Once you’re in there, we can’t talk at all.”

Paisen exhaled noisily. “No sense delaying any longer.”

“You’ll ask about me? If they’ll leave me alone, and I can come home?”

“Yeah,” Paisen said. She opened the door and stood up, straightening her dark wool suit coat. Then she strode toward the office’s entrance.

Inside, she entered the security checkpoint, where she waited while a full-body scanner verified she was unarmed. The guard had her remove the metal disc from her shirt pocket – Paisen handed it to him to inspect it, and then he gave it back. She approached the receptionist’s desk next, noting two Senate Guards conspicuously positioned at the far end of the waiting area, outside the senator’s office door. The receptionist pointed her to an automated kiosk, which took her photo, and then asked for her name and the name of her host. Paisen typed quickly, received a visitor’s badge a moment later, and then took a seat in the waiting area. A news program was playing on the viewscreen, reporting on a civil conflict in the Territories – Paisen tuned it out, dialing up her auditory sensors to focus on other sounds in the office.

After three minutes, the only other person in the waiting room – a large man in a suit and tie – sighed and walked back over to the receptionist.

“When did you say Senator Mastic will see me? My appointment was nearly an hour ago.”

The receptionist smiled apologetically. “She sends her regrets, sir. I’m afraid she’s running a bit behind this morning, she had an emergency conference call that she had to attend. She’ll be with you very soon.”

The man sighed again, noisily, and took his seat. Then a young man in a tie and rolled-up shirt-sleeves walked into the room. Paisen recognized him from the pictures Dasi had shown her, and his badge confirmed him as a member of Senator Mastic’s public relations team. He looked at the man, briefly, then saw Paisen.

“Dasi?”

Paisen stood up, smiling. “Hi, Giron.”

“Oh man, it’s good to see you.” He hugged her, briefly. Then he stood back, holding her at arms’ length. “Dasi, where have you been?”

“Can we go someplace private?” she asked.

“Of course,” he said. Giron led her to an empty office, and closed the door.

“So …,” Giron began, taking a seat at the desk. “What happened to you?”

“It’s complicated,” Paisen told him. “I’ll tell you, but first I need to ask a favor.”

“Sure,” he shrugged. “Anything.”

“I need you to get me in to see Senator Mastic immediately. Her life is in danger.”

Giron frowned. “What? I mean, I can try, but … if she’s in danger, shouldn’t we tell her Senate Guards first?”

Paisen shook her head. “No, we might not be able to trust them.”

“Why not?” Giron leaned back in his chair. “Dasi, this is all kind of weird. What’s going on?”

“Giron, you have to trust me – the threat is real, and we’re running out of time. I’ll tell you everything soon, but I need to see Mastic first.”

He bit his lip, studying her. “Okay,” he said, finally. “I’ll go see if I can work some scheduling magic with the chief of staff. Hang out in the lobby, I’ll come get you.”

Paisen smiled with relief. “Thanks, Giron.”

She walked back to her seat in the lobby, pushing her way past a gaggle of Senate Guards clustered around the reception area.

“She’ll be right out to see you, Senator Blackwell,” she heard the receptionist say.

Blackwell!

Paisen finished sitting down, and then casually turned to examine the group of newcomers. Six Senate Guards had spread themselves around the reception area, two near the checkpoint, two near the entrance to the staff offices, and two more – a man and a woman – near Paisen in the seating area. A middle-aged man in a suit stood leaning against the reception desk, distractedly reading from a datascroll. She could only see part of his face, but it matched the photos she had studied of Senator Blackwell. The senator checked his watch quickly, then went back to his datascroll.

If I could talk to both senators at the same time, so much the better … do I try to find Giron again?

Paisen scanned the senator’s security detail disinterestedly, then picked up a datascroll next to her seat and pretended to flip through the latest news reports.

Six Senate Guards. He sure brought a lot of firepower for a friendly office visit.

She tabbed through two more stories, then frowned.

And they’re not arrayed in any kind of protective formation. They’re positioned to control access to the office area.

In her neural interface, Paisen accessed the video feed she had taken of Senator Blackwell from several seconds before. She froze the video when he lifted his arm to check his watch. After a second, she dismissed the footage.

He’s wearing a counter bracelet.

She took a deep breath.

They’re all contractors. And I’m right in the middle of their assignment.

“Senator!”

Paisen looked up: Senator Mastic had emerged from her inner office; she stood between her own Senate Guards, who flanked the door to her office. Behind her, Paisen could see a book-lined office, with a large wooden desk under a viewport that looked out over Anchorpoint’s asteroid. Mastic smiled at Blackwell. “You’re earlier than I anticipated. My apologies for the delay.”

“No need to apologize,” Blackwell told her, straightening and handing his datascroll to one of his bodyguards. “I was just catching up on some messages.”

“Mary?!” Paisen cried, dropping her datascroll and standing quickly.

The female bodyguard across from her frowned, and looked over to her closest colleague for help.

“Mary! I can’t believe it’s you!” Paisen shot her a broad smile.

“I’m not …,” the woman said, but Paisen was already rushing over to her. Blackwell had stopped in his tracks, confused.

“Oh my god, I haven’t seen you since high school!” Paisen said.

Before the woman could react, she leaned in for a hug, slipping her hand inside the woman’s suit coat.

“Hey!” the woman protested, but Paisen hugged her close, grasping the woman’s pistol and twisting her upper body around. With the gun still in its holster, she fired blindly, but her first two rounds hit Blackwell in the chest, and Paisen shifted aim, putting a neat hole through the forehead of Blackwell’s nearest Senate Guard.

“Get Mastic out of here!” she shouted at Mastic’s guards, but the woman in her arms had recovered her wits, and she tripped Paisen, toppling both of them to the floor behind a row of easy chairs.

Paisen twisted the pistol as she fell, and managed to fire twice into the woman’s torso from point-blank range. The woman gasped and went limp. Paisen heard other guns firing from out by the reception desk, and return fire from Mastic’s office door. She glanced across the floor and saw both of Mastic’s guards down, bleeding from multiple wounds. The door to Mastic’s office was shut. Paisen shifted her face and hair, transforming herself to mimic the female contractor she had just killed. She stood again, appearing from behind the chairs.

The two remaining contractors shifted their aim to cover her.

“Did you get Mastic?” she asked them, her heart pounding.

The closest man frowned, and for a second, Paisen saw his finger tense on the trigger. Then he pointed his weapon at the ground. “I think so.”

“Well, go check!” she told him. “I’ll cover you.”

The man nodded and ran past her.

“I’ve got the entrance,” the contractor near the security checkpoint told her, turning back to face the entrance.

“Great,” she told him. She shot him in the back of the head, then turned and gunned down the last contractor as he tried to spin around.

“Jesus Christ,” she swore.

She took a magazine from the dead woman’s belt and reloaded the pistol. Then she jogged to Mastic’s office. The door was locked, but she pulled a keycard off of one of the dead guards, and waved it against the lock. The door slid open a second later.

“Senator Mastic?”

She knelt and peeked into the office, but saw no one. Paisen stood carefully and stepped inside, palming the door closed behind her. The office appeared empty, but Paisen’s enhanced hearing brought her the sound of ragged breathing.

Behind the desk.

“That was a Guild hit, Senator, but they’re all dead now. I’m not here to hurt you.”

Paisen crossed the room and edged slowly around the desk, pistol up. Mastic sat on the floor, her back to the desk. Her hands clutched at her silk chemise, which was stained with blood. She flinched when she saw Paisen.

“It’s okay, I’m not going to kill you,” Paisen reassured her, kneeling.

“You killed Blackwell,” Mastic managed, wincing in pain as Paisen applied pressure to one of the bullet wounds.

“That wasn’t Blackwell. They probably sent a team for him, too.”

“Warn him,” Mastic coughed. “Phone on the desk.”

The handset was off the cradle, Paisen saw.

And streaked with blood.

“Did you already call for an ambulance?” Paisen asked her.

Mastic nodded.

Paisen stood and dialed Blackwell’s office. Eventually, a generic automated message answered. She hung up, and then noticed an inbound call on the screen. She answered.

“This is Mastic,” she said, mimicking the senator’s voice.

“Senator, your ambulance is ready to leave, but I’m afraid it’s going to be delayed. The attackers opened the station’s hull in several places, and we can’t reach you until we can repressurize those passages and unseal the automated compartment locks.”

“There’s no way in or out?” Paisen asked.

“No, ma’am, not yet. But we’re working on it.”

Paisen hung up, and squatted down next to Mastic.

“Ambulance is en route, but the Group sealed off this wing with hull breaches, so it’s going to be a little while. There was no answer at Blackwell’s.”

Mastic frowned. “Receptionist … always answers.”

“Not if the receptionist is dead,” Paisen pointed out. “You’ve got hemobots?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Then there’s a decent chance you’ll see the end of the day. Senator, do you know who I am?”

Mastic shook her head. “No.”

“Does the name 339 mean anything to you?”

“The one that got away,” Mastic said.

“Yeah. I was on Emerist when they killed Lizelle. He told me to find you and Blackwell.”

“Trying to get rid of us – no more oversight, no more control. The Guild run wild.”

“Lizelle said each of you had a secret. His was the name of the family that runs the Guild – Nkosi.”

Mastic groaned. “God, it hurts. Even with the hemobots.”

“You can tell them to increase the dosage, but I need you to focus for a second, first,” Paisen told her. “Do you have the access codes to the Guild’s finances?”

“No. I know where they are located.”

Paisen hung her head. “Fuck.”

“You want your money,” Mastic guessed.

“You’re god damn right I do. I made a deal with Lizelle: the money I’m owed, in return for Nkosi. Will you honor it?”

Mastic rested her head against the side of the desk, closing her eyes.

“Senator?” Paisen asked.

“Yes, I’ll honor it.”

“I want my money, and 621’s money, too. And Dasi Apter – Lizelle’s staffer, the girl that found out about the Guild – I want her contract canceled, she can go free.”

“Yes, fine,” Mastic said. She took a shuddering breath. “But after Nkosi is dead, the Guild lives on. Not a word from either of you about what you’ve seen.”

“Deal,” Paisen said.

Mastic smiled faintly. “A deal with the devil. But which of us is the devil, I wonder …?” She trailed off.

Paisen squeezed her arm. “Stay with me. I still need the location.”

Mastic’s eyes fluttered open. She licked her lips. “Chennai,” she breathed. “The Surat Khan Tower.”

20

In the Janus Group control room, the digital clock switched to three a.m. By convention, the room was manned continuously so as to monitor missions in real time, as they occurred on planets spread throughout the galaxy. But the late night hours rarely saw a full complement of techs and supervisors, much less a double shift. Tonight was an exception.

“Something’s wrong,” Altaras repeated. He and his Crisis Team sat with Feykin and the director in a sealed conference room overlooking the tiers of work stations below.

Feykin stood up and rubbed the back of his neck. “How long has it been now?”

“Twelve minutes since Team Two entered Mastic’s office complex. Five minutes since Team One reported mission complete at Blackwell’s office.”

“Where is Team One now?”

“Dispersed. They’ve already shifted identities, they should be heading for the transit hub.”

A tech wearing headphones raised his hand. “I’m monitoring emergency radio traffic on multiple channels,” he said.

“Shit,” Altaras noted. He glanced self-consciously at Director Nkosi, but she was focused on the tech.

“What’s the message?” Feykin demanded.

The tech listened for several seconds. “Shooting at Mastic’s office. Blackwell was shot, Mastic is wounded, requesting medical attention. Active shooters still in the office.”

“Wait,” Feykin said, “Blackwell was shot?”

“One of Mastic’s guards must have shot the contractor posing as Blackwell,” Nkosi guessed. “He failed to infiltrate her office successfully.”

“I’m notifying 700 to detonate the charges on the hull and isolate the office complex,” Altaras said. “That will keep the first responders out for a while.” He looked at Nkosi. “Should I tell 700 to reinforce Team Two, as well?”

“Yes,” she said. “Send him in.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And remind him that he’s failed me twice now in critical situations. I won’t tolerate a third time.”

* * *

Dasi checked her watch for the fifth time in as many minutes. When she looked up, she saw an unmarked car pull up to the main entrance to Mastic’s office. Five heavily armed, uniformed police officers hurried out, leaving the car’s doors open in their haste. Four of them disappeared into the office complex – the fifth paused outside the door, glancing up and down the interior roadway briefly. Dasi ducked as he looked in her direction, but she caught a brief glimpse of his scarred face before he entered the complex.

The burned guildsman from Emerist, the one who killed Khyron!

Dasi chewed at her thumb.

The Guild must have sent them in to try to kill Mastic. Paisen’s in there, she’ll recognize him, just like I did. But she’s not armed.

Dasi unbuckled her seatbelt, and put her hand on the door switch.

This is crazy. I don’t even have a gun.

She screwed her eyes shut. In her mind, she could feel 700 tapping her forehead with the pencil, an evil glint in his eyes.

He killed Khyron! But Paisen told me to just stay here.

“Stay here, Dasi. Don’t tell anyone about the Guild, Dasi. Just play along, Dasi, and I’ll get you off this planet … someday.”

Dasi opened her eyes and kicked the door open.

I’m tired of everybody telling me what to do.

* * *

Even with her enhanced hearing turned up to maximum amplification, Paisen nearly missed the sound.

Someone outside the office door.

She touched Mastic on the shoulder.

“Where can I see your security camera feed?” she hissed, but Mastic was unconscious, sedated by her hemobots.

Paisen kept her pistol pointed at the door and searched the senator’s desk with her free hand, pulling a datascroll from under a pile of printouts. She turned it on, but the device prompted her for a fingerprint to log in. Paisen grabbed Mastic’s hand and mashed a finger against the screen.

“Security feed,” she whispered, when the device was unlocked.

A program opened up, presenting her with a variety of camera options, along with controls for the office’s doors and locks. She touched the camera in the waiting room area. A uniformed policeman stepped back from the outside of the door, and Paisen saw that he had attached a breaching panel to the door itself. He moved to the right of the door, shouldering his auto-rifle and taking up position behind another officer. On the left side of the door, three other cops were also stacked up, ready to assault.

Shit. Are you guys cops, or more Group assets? Probably contractors – cops would have knocked first.

She watched as the assaulter closest to the door held a fist in the air, with five fingers up. The man switched to four fingers, then three.

Starting the countdown.

When he held up just one finger, Paisen tapped on the button to open the office door. The door slid dutifully open, disappearing into the wall. The assaulters triggered the breaching charge a split second later, and the explosion ripped through the wall, instantly killing the two contractors on the right side of the doorway.

Two down, three to go.

On the screen, Paisen watched as the assaulters on the left side of the door backed away from the open entrance. The rear man scanned the waiting room, and she saw him point his weapon at the camera. She heard the gun fire, and the feed went dead, but not before she caught a glimpse of the man’s burn-ravaged face.

Hello again, dickhead.

Paisen kept her pistol pointed at the door. Through the open frame, she heard sounds of movement outside in the waiting area.

They’re planning something. Gotta catch them in the doorway – engage them one-by-one. That’s where they’re most vulnerable.

A flicker of movement caught her eye – she zoomed in and saw that a micro-drone identical to the one she had used on Fusoria had crept onto the door’s frame. Paisen took careful aim and fired once, then again, knocking it down, but the contractors had already located her. She ducked behind the desk as a fusillade of guided bullets arced in through the door, slamming into the picture window behind her.

Paisen dropped onto the floor, lying flat, with her hands and head peeking past the end of the desk. She brought the pistol up just as the first assaulter dashed into the room, hot on the heels of the guided bullets. He saw her down on the floor and shifted aim, but the split second delay was all Paisen needed – two rounds to the forehead knocked him down. The next assaulter was already in the doorway taking aim; Paisen squeezed off a quick round, then pulled her head back behind the desk as his rounds impacted the carpet where she had just been. The contractor kept firing, shifting his point of aim and sending round after round into and over the desk.

He’s laying down suppressive fire.

Paisen put her back to the desk, squatting next to Mastic’s unconscious form. The viewport behind the desk was cracked from bullet impacts, but in the fractured glass, she could just make out the contractor’s reflection. He was moving clockwise away from the door, seeking a better angle on her position. She reversed her grip on the pistol, then held it up over the edge of the desk above her head, pointing behind her.

Paisen opened fire, tracking the contractor as he moved. He fired back, and she heard the desk’s wood splinter as his rounds landed near her pistol. She hit him with her fourth shot, but his body armor absorbed the weaker pistol round. She had found her aim, however, and hit him four more times, finally dropping him.

“I know that sound,” 700 told her.

She panicked, scanning the viewport glass, and saw his reflection – he had entered while she was distracted, and moved to the other side of the room.

“That was the sound of a pistol’s slide locking open on an empty chamber. You’re empty.”

Paisen checked the pistol – he was right.

“Stand up, 339,” he ordered.

Paisen stood, and set the empty pistol on the desk.

700 smiled, covering her with his auto-rifle. “Back away from the senator.”

Paisen complied, coming out from behind the desk. She shuffled toward the contractor she had killed last, glancing at his rifle.

“That’s far enough,” 700 told her.

He moved to the back of the desk, watching Paisen carefully. He indicated Mastic with the barrel of the gun.

“Is she dead?”

“Yeah,” Paisen said.

700 arched an eyebrow at her, then stepped back. He fired twice, hitting Mastic in the head. The senator slumped over onto the floor.

“Now she’s dead.”

“Jesus,” Paisen said, grimacing.

“What did she tell you?” 700 asked.

“Nothing. She just wanted to know if she could count on my vote in the next election.”

700 laughed. He slung his rifle across his chest, and Paisen watched as he drew his pistol, and then unloaded it. “Do you know something?”

“What?”

“They can’t hear us in here. Headquarters, I mean. They can’t see my feed.”

He crossed the room, keeping one hand on his rifle, and squatted, unloading the other two contractors’ weapons.

“So?” Paisen asked.

“So … that means we have some privacy. Just like last time. The director is desperate to get you back in custody – she feels we owe you some special treatment after all the grief you’ve caused.”

700 stood up and dropped the magazine out of his rifle. He pulled on the charging handle, ejecting the weapon’s remaining round.

“But I’ve been a good little contractor for her, considering. So I think I deserve to have some fun. But bullets are so impersonal … and efficient.”

“You want to fight me?” Paisen asked.

“No. I want to hurt you,” he said, licking his lips, “and then I want to kill you.”

Paisen shifted into a ready stance. “Come on then, psycho. I have a feeling there are women out there who will be glad to hear you’re dead. A number of women.”

“Seventy-two.” The scars on 700’s face twisted awkwardly as he smiled. “That’s the number of women. But they’re all dead.”

He moved more quickly than she had anticipated, and planted a vicious kick on her stomach, knocking her back into Mastic’s desk. Paisen recovered and circled toward the office’s door, but 700 blocked her, forcing her away from the exit and the weapons lying in the lobby.

Paisen feinted, and then tagged him with a right hook to the jaw, but her left missed, and opened her up to a brutal punch to her kidneys. She cried out in pain.

He’s stronger than I am.

She kicked him in the shin, closing with him and grappling for a second, seeking a good arm-hold for a throw. But 700 broke away and dodged back, batting away the knee she sent toward his ribs. She tried a punch, but he ducked under it easily.

And maybe faster, too.

He grinned at her, then moved in close, shrugging off another of her right hooks to grab her by the arm and then flip her to the ground. Paisen landed heavily, and groaned. He kicked her hard in the ribs, and then dropped quickly on top of her, straddling her with his legs. She brought her arms up to shield her head, and winced as he battered her with a flurry of heavy punches. He drew back and then leaned into the final blow with all of his weight. His fist found her jaw, and she saw stars for several seconds.

700 stood up and backed away. “Get up,” he said.

She rolled onto her stomach, and spat a gob of blood onto the carpet. She tongued her teeth experimentally, and felt one of them move. Paisen scanned the floor near her, but it was devoid of anything she could use as a weapon. She sighed and pushed herself off the floor, then straightened up.

700 grabbed for her again, but she twisted this time, and knocked the wind from him with a swift elbow to the solar plexus. He stepped back, wheezing and laughing.

“Nice one,” he coughed.

They grappled again, both searching for an advantageous position. Paisen tried to gouge his eyes, but he shook his head, and grabbed her by the hair. He yanked her head down, bringing his knee up at the same time. Paisen felt her nose break; she collapsed onto her knees.

700 circled her, then kicked her in the back, knocking her to the floor. He grabbed her hair again and pulled her back to her knees, wrapping his arm around her neck and cinching the choke-hold tight. Paisen grabbed at his arm, but she could not budge it. 700 squeezed. Paisen elbowed him once, twice, and a third time, but she couldn’t shake him loose. Her hemobots sent a low oxygen warning notification to her heads-up display. They went into emergency mode automatically, collecting in her lungs to convert some of the carbon dioxide back into oxygen. But the pressure on her neck prevented them from carrying the oxygenated blood to her brain, and she could feel her consciousness beginning to fade.

Abruptly, 700 let go. Paisen collapsed onto the floor, gasping for air. He turned her onto her back, sat on her stomach, and wrapped both hands around her neck.

“Goodbye, 339,” he said watching her face as she struggled.

“I’ll see you in hell,” she managed. She checked that the metal disc was still tucked inside her shirt pocket, found the detonator bracelet on her wrist, and pressed the button.

Nothing happened.

Damn it. The signal’s blocked by the office’s communications shielding!

She felt 700’s fingers tighten around her neck. She scratched at him, and tried to heave him off by bucking her hips, but he was too heavy. Her vision blurred, and then a gunshot rang out. 700 slumped over, blood pouring from a massive head wound.

Paisen gasped, sucking in air. After a few breaths, she pushed the lifeless form off of her and stood up, wiping blood from her face. Dasi stood in the doorway, a look of surprise and alarm on her face, and an auto-pistol in one hand.

“Next time, hold the pistol with two hands,” Paisen croaked. “One-handed shooting is a great way to waste ammunition.” She cleared her throat. “Not that I’m complaining, or anything ….”

Dasi lowered the gun. “It kind of sounds like you are.”

Paisen grimaced. “Yeah, well … it’s been a little tense around here, you know?” She took the pistol from Dasi and wiped down the trigger and grip with her shirt, removing the younger woman’s fingerprints. Then she dropped the gun next to one of the dead contractors. Dasi stood rooted in the doorway.

“Are you okay?” Paisen asked.

“I think so,” Dasi said, shivering. She tore her eyes away from 700’s body.

“Well, then, let’s get the hell out of here.”

Dasi noticed Senator Mastic’s body. “Did you get to her in time?”

“Mastic? Yeah. She gave me the location, but 700 came in before I could get her out. Now come on … the Senate Guards will be swarming all over this place any minute.”

They walked through the waiting area, side-stepping the blood pooling on the carpeted floor. As they reached the reception area, they saw Giron and two other staffers peering cautiously out the door that led into the main office area. Giron’s jaw dropped when he saw the two women, one covered in blood.

“I’d stay there, if I were you,” Dasi told him.

He nodded dumbly.

Outside, Paisen scanned the wide roadway, searching for signs of the police.

“Mikolos, do you read me?”

“I’m here,” he radioed back.

“We’re going to need a new plan for pickup,” Paisen told him. “We can’t get out of this section and back to the docking bays. Lift off and come to my location.”

“Understood,” he said. “You’d best figure it out quickly, air traffic control is about to shut down all civilian traffic. Some kind of emergency situation. I imagine you’re in the middle of it.”

“Yeah, that’s us.”

Paisen opened the door to their ground car and climbed behind the wheel. “You still have that high energy prototype disc I gave you?” she asked Dasi.

“Uh huh,” Dasi said. “Why?”

“I’m thinking we’re going to try something stupid.”

Dasi handed her the disc, and Paisen stuck it in her shirt pocket. She backed out of the parking spot and drove the wrong way up the street, back toward the multi-story viewport they had passed on their way in. Several cars honked as they dodged to avoid her. Paisen ignored them, and screeched to a halt next to the floor-to-ceiling viewport.

“Got any gum?” she asked.

Dasi shook her head. “No.”

“Check the glove compartment for tape, or glue, or something.”

“Nope,” Dasi reported. “Just the rental paperwork.”

Paisen climbed out of the car and lay down, sticking her head and arms under the wheel-well. She appeared a moment later, and Dasi watched, frowning, as the older woman smeared axle grease on both of the metal discs. Then Paisen jogged over to the viewport and pressed the grease-covered discs onto the glass several feet apart, at shoulder height. She wiped her hands on her pants and then jumped back into the car.

“Mikolos, ETA?” she asked.

The bright yellow ship pulled into view several hundred meters outside the viewport a second later.

“Disregard, I see you.”

“I’m getting a lot of angry radio messages from air traffic control,” he warned.

Farther down the road, a massive bulkhead lifted upwards, revealing a squadron of emergency vehicles, their lights flashing. Paisen put the car in gear and roared toward them. Then she braked hard, spinning the wheel to turn them around. She drove forward a few feet, lining the car up with the viewport.

“Paisen,” Dasi said nervously. “Is this car pressurized?”

“I doubt it,” Paisen said. “Hold your breath.”

Dasi buckled her seatbelt.

“Mikolos, remember how we got back on board on Emerist?”

“Yes,” he said.

Paisen checked her rear view mirror – the police vehicles were approaching fast. “Okay, same plan. And stand by to rapidly repressurize the cargo bay once we’re in.”

Out in the vacuum, the Hurasu spun on its axis, and Paisen could just make out the cargo bay door opening up. She threw the car into gear and pushed the accelerator to the floor. Dasi closed her eyes and braced her arms against the dashboard. As they raced toward the window, Paisen held up her detonator bracelet, selected the setting to detonate all of the discs at once, and pressed the button. The discs exploded, shattering the lower half of the window, and a second later, the car punched through the gaping hole, arcing out into space toward the waiting ship.

21

Through the window of the senator’s mansion, Rath spotted an air car streaking away from the airship. It angled west, and Rath saw the Hurasu appear from out of a bank of cloud, on an intercept course.

Good. Paisen and Dasi made it out.

Then a movement in his peripheral vision caught his attention. Rath bellowed a warning to Beauceron and threw himself back from the doorway. Out in the hall, the grenade exploded before Rath could kick the door closed; the shockwave knocked both men to the floor. Rath rolled to his side, pointing the pistol through the smoke of the hall. He switched to infrared vision on his optical implants, and a second later, saw a white-hot form duck around the corner of the stairs. Rath fired once, and the form yanked back behind cover.

Shit. I missed.

He stood and dashed over to Beauceron, pulling the detective to his feet, and wincing as his broken ribs burned in response.

“You okay?”

Beauceron coughed, nodding. Rath pushed him toward the back of the room, at a set of tall double doors.

Gotta get out of here … though I have no fucking clue where those doors lead.

Beauceron fumbled with the latch, while Rath covered their rear. Another grenade rolled into the room.

Fucking spamming us with the grenades!

Rath pulled Beauceron down behind a large, wooden bed. The grenade exploded harmlessly, and Rath leapt up, tugging at the double doors, until finally they gave way, and swung open. But instead of another room, the doors opened onto a small balcony, looking out over the clouds of Emerist.

“Fuck!” Rath swore. “Come on, Martin – maybe we can climb over.”

A rifle appeared at the doorway into the room, and fired a sustained burst, sweeping across the room. Rath and Beauceron stepped out onto the balcony and took cover on either side of the doors. Rath fired a single round in return, then took a better look at the balcony. The walls on either side were sheer, without handholds, and though there was another balcony below them, it was at least four stories down.

We’re trapped.

He looked at Beauceron, who had reached the same conclusion. The detective shrugged.

“Well, this can’t much get worse,” Rath told him.

The second air car swung into view. Rath brought his pistol up, but before he could fire, he heard a distant explosion, and felt the airship tilt drunkenly to one side. The air car swerved backwards, careful to avoid a collision with the larger vessel. It disappeared over the roof of the mansion. Another explosion jolted the airship, and Rath felt them tilt suddenly backwards – he and Beauceron were thrown against the railing of the balcony. He looked down through the railing and saw the yawning void of Emerist’s clouds below him.

With a lurch, he felt the great ship start falling.

Rath heard a shout of alarm, and looked up to see a contractor sliding down the floor of the room, which was now perpendicular to the ground. The man scrabbled for purchase, before catching hold of the balcony door above Rath. The contractor’s rifle tumbled past Rath, and the man caught Rath’s eye. He let go with one hand, and reached for the auto-pistol in his belt holster. Rath shot him once, and the man fell, bouncing off the railing next to Rath before vanishing into the mists below.

The ship was nearly standing on its end, and Rath glanced over to see Beauceron holding tight to the railing with both hands, trying to position his feet against the railing’s supports so that he could stand up.

“We’re not just tipping, we’re falling!” Rath shouted.

“I know!” Beauceron replied.

The mists thickened as they plunged deeper into Emerist’s atmosphere, and Rath coughed as the acrid gas irritated his throat. When he looked up again, the air car was there, hovering near them, matching the airship’s speed as it fell. Rath fired two rounds at it before his pistol locked open on an empty chamber. The bullets bounced harmlessly off the car’s exterior plating. Rath watched in fascination as the barrels on the car’s cannon spun up, gathering speed. He closed his eyes.

This is how it ends.

With a sound like a massive sheet of metal being torn in two, a cannon fired, and Rath heard Beauceron give an incoherent cheer. Confused, Rath opened his eyes.

The Group air car, leaking smoke and flames from numerous cannon holes, plummeted down and smashed into the side of Lizelle’s mansion with an ear-splitting crash. An Interstellar Police cruiser swept into view.

Rath turned away from the police car, shielding his head from view while he transformed himself. After a second, he turned back, and waved one arm frantically above his head. The cruiser nosed in toward them, closing the gap. Rath saw a police officer climb out the side wearing a harness – as the car turned its side toward the balcony, the man tossed them another harness attached to a rope, and motioned that Rath should get into it. Rath pulled it on and then stepped off the balcony, letting the rope take his weight.

After a few seconds of dangling, they winched him up, and Rath felt strong hands pulling him into the cruiser.

“Are you okay, Senator Lizelle?” the officer asked.

“I’ll be all right,” Rath told him, sitting down.

The man lobbed another harness over to Beauceron, who climbed awkwardly into it, and then half stepped, half fell over the balcony’s railing. The air car was already moving away from the falling airship – it pulled Beauceron to safety, and Rath felt the cruiser gaining altitude, heading back up to the sunny, clear air of the upper atmosphere. The policeman hauled Beauceron in seconds later, and sat him next to Rath. The detective eyed Rath appraisingly, then sighed, shaking his head.

The police officer slid the outer door shut, then knelt next to Rath.

“I just need to check you for wounds, sir,” he told Rath.

“Of course,” Rath said, letting the man inspect him. “Listen, I need to get to the spaceport at once.”

The cop shook his head. “Sir, we have orders to take you to our station until the threat has been neutralized.”

Rath grabbed him by the shoulder. “No! I was attacked by Interstellar Police back there. Whether they were really police or not, I have no idea. But until we can figure out what’s going on, you’ll tell no one where I am. Got it?”

The man frowned. “We already reported that we found you, sir.”

“Send one more report. Tell them you were hit by the enemy air car, and then shut the radio off. Until we know who we can trust, we have to be cautious.”

The policeman looked around uncertainly. Beauceron opened his mouth to speak, but Rath put his hand on the detective’s knee and squeezed hard, silencing him.

“That’s an order, son,” Rath told the uniformed officer. “Now go tell the pilots, and get me to the spaceport.”

The man relented, and moved forward to talk to the pilots.

“Must we continue to lie?” Beauceron asked Rath in a whisper. “We could simply turn ourselves in ….”

“Are you sure we can trust these guys?” Rath asked in reply.

They landed at the spaceport less than five minutes later. Rath unbuckled his seatbelt as they settled onto the tarmac of a private landing pad, and the police officer slid open the cruiser’s door, hopping out. He helped Rath and Beauceron climb out.

“Thank you for your help,” Rath told him.

The man nodded. “Sir, if you’ll just wait a minute, my pilot wants a word.”

The pilot was already stepping out of his door. He shook hands with Rath. “Senator, I get your concern, but we need to radio in that we have you in a safe location. You gotta understand that our boss is going to kill us if he finds out we let you just wander off into the spaceport without any escort.”

Rath sighed. “I understand. I never properly thanked you for saving us back there. Thank you, officer.”

Rath pulled the pilot in toward him, hugging him close. With his free hand, he drew the pilot’s pistol, switching it to Stun by feel. He fired three quick shots, hitting the co-pilot through the open door, then putting a round into the pilot’s side, and finally dropping the third officer.

Beauceron looked down at their twitching forms and shook his head in dismay. “That hurts, you know.”

“Trust me,” Rath told him. “I know. Anyway, they’ll be fine in an hour or two.”

He shifted his face and hair into one of his cover identities, and stripped out of the air car harness and his combat vest. Rath tossed his auto-pistol into the air car, then held his damaged Forge up, peering at it. Lubricant leaked out of several shrapnel holes, dripping onto the tarmac.

“You brought that with you? I thought it was empty,” Beauceron said.

“It is. What do you think – can I get it through security?”

“Leaking like that?” Beauceron shook his head. “No. It’s broken, leave it!”

Rath frowned. “But I’ve had it forever.” He sighed, then placed the Forge carefully on floor of the air car, and patted it. “I’ll come back, buddy.”

Beauceron shot him a disbelieving look. “Ready now?”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

The two men jogged over to the terminal entrance.

“Martin, you know that money you had set aside for your retirement?”

The detective sighed, palming open the doors to the airport. “Yes.”

“How do you feel about a vacation to Anchorpoint?”

“Sounds thrilling.”

“Great,” Rath told him, as the doors slid shut behind them. “You’re buying.”

* * *

“Mission planning?” Beauceron asked, as they finished their meal in the spaceliner’s small cabin.

Rath smiled. “You’re getting the hang of it. Yeah, let’s do it.”

“Inventory is easy,” Beauceron noted sardonically. “We have nothing.”

“Not true,” Rath said. “I have three broken ribs. I think it’s three, at least.” He fingered his side gingerly, and winced. “But no weapons, no Forge, and no money.”

“I have some cuts from shrapnel. And some money,” Beauceron said. “Substantially less money than I had before.”

“Sorry,” Rath told him. “The spacelines gouge you on these last-minute fares. Just be glad we got off Emerist before they put the whole place on security lockdown.”

“What do we do when we get to Anchorpoint?” Beauceron asked.

“Depends. We check our messages first, and see what Paisen and Dasi are up to. First priority is to link up with them. Unlike us, they’ll be flying direct, though – that means they’ll be several hours ahead of us. They may have already made contact with Mastic and Blackwell.”

“If we can’t get in touch with them, we’ll need to try to find the senators ourselves,” Beauceron said.

“And if the Group gets there first, and kills the senators, we’ll go public with the info we have,” Rath finished.

“All the evidence is on the Hurasu,” Beauceron pointed out. “Let’s hope the Group is not waiting to intercept our friends.”

“Let’s hope they’re not waiting to intercept us,” Rath said. “Okay, so the plan is to find Paisen, basically. And if she’s a no show, I gotta think about how we’re going to get in to see the senators.” He took the necklace from his pocket, and passed the multi-colored crystal beads through his fingers idly, while he thought.

Beauceron watched him for a minute. “You still have that. You should have listed it during inventory,” he kidded Rath.

Rath looked down at the beads. “Mm. Kind of a good luck charm at this point.” He smiled. “I’m going to be sad to give it away. Will she be able to visit me when I’m in jail?”

“Able to?” Beauceron asked. “Yes, from time to time.”

“But will she want to?” Rath finished for the detective. He pocketed the necklace. “Probably not.”

* * *

The ship shuddered, and then exited faster-than-light travel. With nothing to pack, Rath and Beauceron were already waiting at one of the spaceliner’s boarding tubes, along with several other business travelers. Rath glanced at Beauceron.

“They shut off the engines,” Rath said.

Beauceron frowned. “How can you tell?”

“I don’t hear them anymore,” Rath answered. One of the businessmen standing nearby shot him a funny look, but Rath ignored it.

“We’re not docked already, are we?” Beauceron asked.

“No.”

A minute later, the captain’s image appeared on a viewscreen on the wall.

“Ah, ladies and gentleman, I’ve been ordered to stay here, outside of Anchorpoint approach. We may be stuck here for a little while: it seems there’s an emergency situation at Anchorpoint, so they’re holding all traffic for the time being. If you have connecting flights, don’t worry, you won’t miss them – there’s nothing outbound at this time, either. Please make yourselves comfortable, and I’ll keep you updated as … well, as I learn more. Thank you for your patience.”

The captain disappeared, replaced with the spaceline’s logo. A new message notification appeared in Rath’s heads-up display. His eyes unfocused as he skimmed it.

“What?” Beauceron asked.

“Let’s go back to the room.”

In the cabin, Rath connected wirelessly to the viewscreen and projected the message, so that Beauceron could read it, too.

Got your message – was starting to think you didn’t make it off Emerist. Group beat us here. They got Blackwell, but I interrupted the mission at Mastic’s office and managed to reach her before they killed her, too. Group HQ is on Chennai, in the Surat Khan Tower. We’re taking our usual private transport there now. The Group at least suspects that we’re alive, and they may assume we know the location now, too. So they may be anticipating a move against them, and/or they’re in the process of relocating HQ. Speed is critical – will plan to move against HQ on arrival, with or without you. p.s. - My companion says to tell you she’s relieved you’re alive. Also, that asshole we keep running into is dead.

Beauceron sat down heavily at the cabin’s desk and sighed. “So all three senators are dead. I can’t condone their actions on the oversight committee … but with no restraints, I shudder to think what the Group will become.”

“At least 700 is dead: that’s a win for humanity in general.” Rath stopped projecting and pulled up the ship’s travel booking interface on the viewscreen. “There’s a direct flight to Chennai waiting at Anchorpoint now. It’s listed as ‘Delayed,’ but they’re still accepting new passengers. I’m booking it.”

“No sense staying here. What do you think she means to do?”

“Paisen?” Rath shrugged. “I don’t know. If it was me, I’d … Christ, I don’t know. I’d scout out the headquarters building, and craft the plan from there.”

“I’m worried she’ll do something drastic. And in her quest to get her money, she’ll ruin our whole case against the Group.”

“Martin, earning that payoff was all we thought about for more than ten years,” Rath said. “I get where she’s coming from.”

“But think how dangerous the Group has become – not just to you, but every citizen of the Federacy. It must be exposed, and dismantled … that’s far more important than two people getting paid. You see that, don’t you?”

Rath studied Beauceron for a time, then exhaled noisily. “Yeah, I know. And maybe there’s a way to do that. I’m just saying that – given the chance, if I were in Paisen’s shoes – I might take that money and run.”

22

The message appeared in Rath’s heads-up display minutes after the ship decelerated out of FTL.

“I’ve got their location,” he told Beauceron. “Not much else to the message, just instructions to meet up ASAP.”

He and Beauceron were standing in the ship’s boarding tube again, and both watched the viewscreen apprehensively, but when this captain’s face appeared, he merely welcomed them to Chennai, and informed them that they would be docked at the transfer station soon.

“Well, that’s a good sign,” Beauceron observed.

On the shuttle, Rath studied Chennai as they descended toward the planet. The surface was deep red, and reminded him of the sand on Fusoria’s beaches – except Chennai was heavily forested, its trees covered in crimson leaves. A series of rolling, parallel hills stretched into the distance as far as he could see, broken only by the skyline of a city that the map in his neural interface labeled Wayhaven.

Can’t see it from this angle, but the Surat Khan Tower is in there … somewhere.

On the ground, Beauceron grumbled again about his dwindling retirement account, but Rath persuaded him to spring for an air taxi, and minutes after leaving the spaceport, the two men climbed out of the taxi and entered a discount hotel near the center of Wayhaven. Rath led Beauceron past the front desk’s automated kiosks, and they rode the elevator up to the twenty-fourth floor. They walked past a maid’s cleaning cart, before finding the room marked 2403. Rath knocked quickly on the door. His enhanced hearing picked up the sounds of someone moving inside, but after nearly two minutes of waiting, the door still had not opened.

Rath looked at Beauceron. “Something’s wrong.”

He accessed the web from his neural interface, and searched for a picture of the hotel manager. When he found it, he shifted his face and hair to match the photo, then strode back down the hallway to the cleaning cart. Rath knocked on the door, and the maid looked up from making the bed. Rath zoomed in on her nameplate.

“Hi, Yuna,” he said. “Recognize me?”

“Yes, sir,” she responded.

Rath gestured to Beauceron, behind him in the hall. “This guest lost his keycard, and I figured I’d save him a trip to the lobby – can I borrow your access card for just a minute?”

“Of course!” She handed it over.

“Thanks. Be right back,” Rath told her.

He and Beauceron moved back down the hall, keyed open the door, and then Rath took the key back to the maid. When he returned, Rath found Beauceron inside, bent over Dasi. The young woman was seated on the floor, handcuffed to the leg of the desk. Beauceron pulled a makeshift gag out of her mouth.

“Thank you!” Dasi took a deep breath. “I was so relieved when Paisen got your message, back on Anchorpoint. We thought for sure you guys had been killed on Emerist. I would hug you, but … I can’t get this handcuff off. You don’t have a key, do you?”

Beauceron shook his head. “No. Dasi, what happened?”

“Paisen happened.” Dasi sighed.

“Where is she?” Rath asked.

Dasi tugged against the handcuff. “Headquarters. She’s going in.”

“Right now?” Rath asked.

“Yeah, she left about twenty minutes ago.”

“What’s her plan?” Rath asked.

“She’s going to blackmail them for the money.”

“By threatening to go public?” Beauceron asked.

Dasi shook her head. “No. I tried to convince her not to, but she wouldn’t listen. And I couldn’t stop her. She built four ten-pound steel weights in her Forge, and then put them in the high energy prototype on the Hurasu. She’s going down into the sub-basements, to place the weights at each corner of the building’s foundation.”

“Oh god,” Beauceron said. “Forty pounds’ worth of metal? That will destroy the whole block, not just the tower! She’ll kill thousands of people!”

Rath held up his hand, motioning the detective to wait. “How’s she getting in?”

“She’s infiltrating the tower, as a worker in one of the other offices. It’s a big building, with lots of offices, so she’s just posing as someone who works on another floor, not a Group employee.”

“We need to warn the police, now,” Beauceron said.

“When everything’s in place,” Dasi continued, “she’s going to put a smaller piece of metal in the lobby, and then leave. We found the front company the Group is operating under. She’ll detonate the lobby piece to get their attention, and then she’s going to call them, and ask for Director Nkosi.”

“She’s not going to detonate the other pieces,” Rath said. “It’s a bluff.”

“It’s not,” Dasi told him. “Once she has the funds, she’s going to detonate all of the pieces, and bring the tower down. She said it was the only way to be sure the Group doesn’t come after us anymore.”

Beauceron gasped. “She knew we’d never go along with this, that’s why she was in a hurry.” He pulled his phone out of his pocket.

Rath put his hand on Beauceron’s arm. “What are you doing?”

“Calling Interstellar Police. This has gone too far – it’s past time we called for help.”

“Maybe we should let her do it,” Rath said, quietly.

“What?” Dasi asked.

Beauceron scowled at him. “How can you say that?”

“It would wipe out the Group. Cut off the head, dismantle them, just like you said. It would save thousands of lives in the long run.”

“At the expense of thousands of lives now. No, Rath.”

“That’s the same logic Lizelle and the senators used,” Dasi pointed out.

“They’re hunting us all,” Rath told them. “If Paisen doesn’t kill them, we’re probably going to die. All of us – you too, Dasi. Paisen might be our best shot at getting clear of all of this.”

“They can’t hunt us if we expose them, if we give Interstellar Police everything we know,” Beauceron said. “We have enough evidence now.”

“We’ve got a good story to sell to the media, sure,” Rath argued. “But barring a confession from the director herself, will any of it hold up in court?”

Beauceron shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. What matters now is saving those lives. We can worry about the courts later.”

Beauceron lifted his phone and started dialing. Rath moved quickly, knocking the phone out of his hand, then slipping the detective into a tight choke hold. Dasi gasped in alarm. Beauceron struggled for a minute, beating ineffectually against Rath’s arms, then slumped forward. Rath set him carefully on the floor.

Dasi eyed Rath with shock. “What are you doing?”

“What I have to,” Rath told her, his face grim. “He’ll wake up in a few minutes.”

Rath pulled a datascroll out of his pocket and powered it on. “Is the Hurasu here on Chennai?”

“Yes,” Dasi said.

Rath typed on the screen, connecting remotely to the ship’s file archive.

“Why?” Dasi asked.

“I’m connecting to the ship’s hard drive, and downloading all of the evidence we collected to this datascroll,” Rath told her.

“I don’t understand,” Dasi said.

The download finished, and Rath accessed the datascroll’s settings menu. He typed for nearly a minute, entering a series of instructions. Finally, he set it in front of Dasi on the floor, out of her reach. The screen showed the audio and video feed from Rath’s implants, and Dasi saw that it was recording.

“I need you to listen closely,” Rath told her. “This is a live feed – you’ll see everything I see, hear everything I hear. If I don’t make it, you’ll have a record of it, something more concrete you can take to Interstellar Police. When he wakes up, have Martin send for someone to saw through this desk and get you free.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going after Paisen.”

“To stop her, or to help her?” Dasi asked.

Rath ignored the question. “Stay safe, Dasi. Tell Martin I’m sorry I knocked him out again. And tell him … tell him I’m going to have to break my promise to him, too.”

“What promise?”

But Rath was already heading for the door.

23

The air car swooped in high over the tower’s roof, circling once, then settling heavily down onto a landing pad.

That’s not a standard, production line model. That car’s been up-armored.

From a window three buildings away, Paisen zoomed in her optical sensors, and watched as two guards emerged from a structure on the roof. Both wore tactical vests and carried auto-rifles. The car’s door swung open, and Paisen saw a woman with long, black hair emerge.

Good morning, Director.

Nkosi followed the two guards into the structure, disappearing from view. Paisen scanned the roof one last time, and then turned away from the window. She grunted as she lifted her Forge from the floor, laden as it was with extra weight, but shouldered it and headed for the building’s elevators.

Back out on the street, Paisen walked toward the Surat Khan Tower, joining the flow of pedestrian traffic headed in to work for the day. The streets were slick from an overnight rain shower, and dark, threatening clouds lingered in the sky above. A cool, wet wind buffeted Paisen as she walked. She glanced up as she approached the tower, taking in the sleek sides of the skyscraper stretching high above her. Then she was inside.

While the other workers continued to the security gates, Paisen made a sharp left across the marble floor, and pushed through an emergency exit door. She hurried down four levels, emerging into a basement utility corridor. She checked the blueprints in her heads-up display, oriented herself, and then set off for the nearest foundation support column.

* * *

Rath leaned on the reception desk in the Surat Khan Tower’s lobby, watching the office workers pass through the security gates toward the elevators. After a short wait, the receptionist handed him a visitor badge for a tech company located on the eighth floor of the tower. He smiled and thanked the woman, then joined the line of people scanning their badges to go through the security gates. When it was his turn, he swiped the visitor badge, and the gate notified him to take elevator C4. Rath, feigning ignorance, walked to the D block of elevators, and waited until he saw an elevator going to the nineteenth floor. He got on.

He was joined by a young man who eyed him with a frown, but Rath just smiled back. When the doors opened, Rath saw they were in a small lobby with a single reception desk, and no chairs. The man hurried quickly through a set of thick doors, which closed before Rath could follow him. He approached the reception desk instead, which sat empty under a generic corporate logo. A holographic avatar of a middle-aged woman in a suit appeared behind the desk.

“May I help you?”

“Yes—”

“Ah, I see you’re visiting another company,” the avatar interrupted, pointing at his badge. “You’ll find vModix on the eighth floor. I’m afraid you’ll have to take the elevator back down to the lobby, then use the ‘C’ block of elevators to get back up to eight.” Behind him, Rath heard the elevator doors open again.

“Actually, I’m in the right place. I’m here to see Director Nkosi.”

The avatar frowned apologetically. “We don’t have any employees by that name,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“Tell her that 621 would like to see her. Tell her I’m here to collect the bounty on 339.”

The avatar smiled at him, and then flickered off. Rath waited. He tapped his fingers on the desk. Moments later, the heavy doors swung open, and Rath saw two armed guards waiting inside. He walked in, and the doors shut behind him.

“Gentlemen,” Rath said, by way of greeting.

One of the men shoved him against the wall face first, and Rath groaned at the fresh wave of pain from his broken ribs. The guard ignored his discomfort, and held him there while his partner frisked Rath thoroughly, patting him down by hand and then scanning his body with a handheld device. Rath’s pockets were empty except for a data drive, which they took, along with his visitor badge. Rath felt them cuff his hands behind his back, and then they pulled him off the wall, holding him between them.

A set of inner doors opened, and an older man appeared. He stood next to Rath, rolled back Rath’s sleeve, and took a DNA sample using a small device. The man waited for several seconds, and when the device beeped, he pocketed it. Only then did he make eye contact with Rath.

“Where is she, 621?” he asked.

“Who are you?” Rath asked.

“Where’s 339?” the man repeated.

“Take me to see Nkosi,” Rath told him. “And I’ll tell you.”

The man’s eyes narrowed. “In that case, we’ll do it the hard way.”

“I wouldn’t,” Rath advised him. “She’s setting up a weapon that can take out this entire building. By the time you get me strapped to the table, we’ll all be dead.”

The man studied Rath, searching for any hint of a lie.

“Clock’s ticking,” Rath told him.

The watch on the man’s wrist buzzed, and he checked it, reading a message off of the screen.

“Bring him,” he told the guards.

They marched him back out to the lobby, and the man scanned his fingerprint on the elevator’s reader. It took them up two more floors.

“Where’s your Forge?” the man asked Rath.

“Back on Emerist somewhere. Why? You going to make me go back and get it?”

The doors slid open, and Rath saw two more guards waiting for them. They took up station behind Rath as he left the elevator, and when he glanced over his shoulder, he saw that both were pointing auto-rifles at him. They passed another reception desk, this one staffed by a real woman, and then emerged through a set of doors into a large executive office.

Nkosi stood looking out the window behind the desk. She turned when she heard them enter.

“Director Nkosi,” Rath said, giving her a tight smile. “As a former Guild employee, it’s a little intimidating to finally meet the woman behind it all.”

“Where is she?” the director asked, ignoring Rath’s jibe.

“I’ll tell you, but I want some guarantees first.”

“What guarantees?”

“I want safe passage out of here, and your word that you’ll never send another contractor after me again.” Rath cleared his throat. “And I want my fifty percent.”

“That’s it?” Nkosi asked, an eyebrow raised.

“That’s it,” Rath echoed. “Fifty for fifty. I just want what I’m owed, per my contract.”

Nkosi pursed her lips. “339 saved you. You’d betray her for the money?”

“I don’t owe her anything,” Rath said.

“If you say so,” Nkosi replied.

“Once I’m out of here,” he continued. “I’ll tell you where to find the other two. But only when I’m safely away.”

“The other two? The detective and the senator’s staffer?”

Rath nodded. “They have all the evidence we’ve collected on the Group.”

Nkosi crossed her arms. “If I let you go, how do I know you’ll keep your word?”

“How do I know you’ll keep yours?” Rath countered.

“We have no way of knowing if he even knows where they are,” the middle-aged man pointed out.

“Who is this guy?” Rath asked Nkosi, nodding at the man. “He’s kind of a prick.”

“Mr. Feykin, my Chief of Operations,” Nkosi told him.

“I can prove I know where they are,” Rath said, turning to Feykin. “Turn on the viewscreen.”

Rath connected his neural interface wirelessly to the screen, and then queued up his video feed, starting with his debate with Beauceron back in the hotel room.

“It’s a bluff,” they heard Rath say.

“It’s not,” Dasi said from the floor, shaking her head. “Once she has the funds, she’s going to detonate all of the pieces, and bring the tower down. She said it was the only way to be sure the Group doesn’t come after us anymore.”

The angle changed, as Rath looked over at Beauceron. “She knew we’d never go along with this, that’s why she was in a hurry,” the detective said.

Rath stopped the footage. “Check the timestamp – that was less than fifteen minutes ago. They’re in a hotel room here, on Chennai. And the girl told me how to find 339, too. She’s here already, in the building … and that weapon doesn’t take long to put in place.”

Nkosi studied Rath carefully. He met her gaze without flinching. The director glanced over to Feykin, who gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head.

“No deal, Feykin?”

“No, ma’am. Absolutely not. If he’s willing to betray his friends, what assurances do we have he’ll deal honestly with us?”

“They’re not my friends, they’re just people I used to find you,” Rath corrected him. “A contractor can’t afford friends – you taught me that, in Training.”

“I’m willing to part with the money in order to be rid of those … nuisances,” Nkosi observed. “But I will be rid of them eventually, with or without your help. So I’m merely buying a more timely resolution, it seems. Paying for convenience.”

Rath watched as she walked around the desk, coming closer to him.

“And accepting your offer puts me at a disadvantage,” she finished.

“Which is?” Rath asked.

“You’d still be alive,” she told him, standing in front of him. She tapped her forehead with a finger. “Along with everything you know about the Group. That’s a liability I can’t accept.”

Rath smiled. “It’s not a liability at all. Do you want to know what I’m going to do with the money? I’m going to have my memory erased. Wiped completely. Check your files – I can’t sleep for more than a few hours without getting a nightmare about the things you made me do, the people I killed. I want to forget it – all of it.”

Nkosi frowned. “So you say. But how do I know you’ll do it?”

“You don’t,” Rath admitted. “Not for sure. But go read my psych profile – it seems to be a source of amusement around here. You’ll see. I don’t want to remember anything about this fucking place.”

Rath checked the time in his heads-up display.

“339’s done by now, Director. Do we have a deal?”

* * *

Dasi saw Beauceron twitch.

“Martin? Can you hear me?”

He rolled over with a groan, and rubbed his forehead. Then he pushed himself up to a sitting position, leaning against the bed.

“Are you okay?”

Beauceron grunted. “My head hurts. Where’s Rath?”

“At Headquarters,” Dasi told him. “He left us a datascroll, he’s streaming his feed to it. I’ve been watching it.”

Beauceron opened his eyes and found the datascroll on the floor. He tilted it so he could see the screen. He saw an office, and a stern-looking woman with her arms crossed.

“That’s Nkosi,” Dasi told him. “Martin, Rath’s betrayed us all. He offered her us – all of us, Paisen too – in exchange for the money, and his freedom.”

Beauceron frowned. “Did he stop Paisen?”

“No,” Dasi said. “Not yet, at least. We have to get out of here before he tells them where we are.”

Beauceron stood up, bracing himself on the bed. “Okay. And we’ve got to get a warning to Interstellar Police. There may still be time.”

He picked up the room’s phone and dialed the operator.

“Could you send maintenance up to our room, please? They’ll need some tools, we have a little issue with the desk.”

He listened for a moment.

“Just send them up, they’ll understand when they get here.”

He set the phone back on its cradle.

“Dasi, I’m going to leave you for a moment – I need to find the nearest police station. This is too important for a phone call.”

“I’ll be okay,” she told him. “Just so long as they get me out of here quickly.”

Beauceron stood and made his way to the door.

“Martin,” Dasi called. “Rath downloaded the evidence to this datascroll.”

“Send it to my phone,” Beauceron told her. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“Be careful,” she told him.

When he was gone, she tapped on the screen. But before she could send Beauceron the files, a message from Rath appeared. Dasi frowned with distaste.

What do you want, traitor?

Then she frowned, and leaned closer to read it.

24

Paisen pushed open the fire exit door and walked across the lobby, stopping next to a large waterfall cascading artfully down the building’s interior wall. She glanced around casually, then slid a small piece of metal out of her pocket, dropping it surreptitiously into the water at the base of the waterfall. She turned and headed for the exit.

The stun dart hit her between her shoulder blades, and she fell forward onto the marble tiles, muscles clenching uncontrollably. As the pain gripped her, she felt someone wrench the detonator bracelet from her wrist, and then they frisked her, stripping her of her Forge and the auto-pistol she had hidden inside it. They tightened handcuffs around her wrists, and then stood her up, dragging her across the lobby to the nearest freight elevator.

The pain had subsided by the time the doors opened on the twenty-first floor. Paisen’s guards marched her, silently, down two corridors, and then through a plush reception area. Two heavy doors swung open, and she found herself in a large office with a set of picture windows at the back. Nkosi and another Group employee stood near the desk, watching her enter. Then she saw Rath. He was flanked by four guards, but one of them was removing the handcuffs from his wrists.

“Rath! You bastard!”

She broke free from her escort, lunging for him with a snarl of fury on her lips. A guard stepped into her path to block her, but she shouldered him roughly in the ribs, then kicked a second guard in the knee-cap. It took three guards to finally subdue her, forcing her to kneel in front of Nkosi. Paisen ignored the director, instead leaning over to spit on the floor near Rath.

“Good luck sleeping with this on your conscience,” she told him.

Rath shrugged. “In a few days, I won’t remember any of this.”

Paisen stuck her chin out, gesturing at Nkosi. “She’s just going to hunt you down and kill you. You know that, right?”

“No,” Nkosi said. “621 has made us a compelling offer. You, your friends, and all the evidence they have, in exchange for his freedom. And his money.” She stood over Paisen, eyeing the contractor haughtily. “I’m looking forward to seeing you die. Slowly.”

“Go fuck yourself,” Paisen told her.

Rath walked over to the desk, where Feykin handed him several sheets of paper. Rath skimmed them quickly, then laid them on the desk.

“You first,” he told Feykin.

The older man produced a pen from his pocket, and signed the paper. Then he handed the pen to Rath.

“You’re signing another contract with these assholes?!” Paisen asked, incredulous.

Rath ignored her, signing the document and then pocketing the pen.

Paisen glared at Rath. “I don’t care what she’s promised you. She’s lying. She’s going to hunt you down, erased memory or not. And I’ll die happy knowing that.”

Rath turned to Nkosi. “Your guards took a data drive from me. My bank account is on it.”

“Feykin?” Nkosi asked.

The Chief of Operations took the data drive from the guard, and crossed to Nkosi’s computer. Rath watched as he plugged it in.

“I see the account link,” Feykin reported.

“My total earnings were one hundred and three million dollars,” Rath said.

Feykin accessed the Group’s financial accounting software, then spent several seconds typing.

“That’s correct.” He clicked several times. “Funds have been transferred,” he said.

“I’d like to verify it, if you don’t mind,” Rath said. “You’ll see a phone number in there as well. Please put it on speakerphone.”

Feykin looked to Nkosi, who nodded. Over the room’s speakers, they heard a dial tone, then a ring.

“Yes?” a voice answered.

“C4ble, it’s Rath. Do you see the funds?”

“Yeah, I see them.”

“Great.” Rath looked over at Feykin. “You can hang up.”

Feykin unplugged the data drive and set it on the desk. Rath looked at Nkosi. “Director, the message?”

She turned to Feykin. “Notify all contractors: 339 has been captured, and 621 is no longer a target.”

Paisen snorted, watching while Feykin accessed the Group’s communications suite. “She’s just going to send another message as soon as you leave, sending them all after you again.”

“I’ll take my chances,” Rath said. “Project it on the viewscreen, please, Mr. Feykin. I’d like to see the message myself.”

The text appeared a moment later. Rath read it closely.

“It’s good.”

On the screen, he watched as Feykin hit Transmit.

“Satisfied?” Nkosi asked.

“Almost,” Rath said. “The detective who recruited me. I want his name.”

“Why?” Nkosi asked.

“I want to pay him a visit,” Rath replied.

“You’re trying my patience. I have no idea what his name is.”

“You can look it up, right?” Rath persisted.

Nkosi scowled at him, then waved a hand at Feykin. The Chief of Operations opened a personnel database, and ran a search query to find the record.

“Kin Haas. Tarkis Police. He’s inactive, for what’s it worth.” Feykin peered closer at the screen. “Dead, apparently.”

“Happy?” Nkosi asked. She smiled at Rath, but her eyes were as cold as ice.

“Yeah, actually. I hated that guy. But I have one more question,” Rath said. “Has the Group ever paid a contractor who reached fifty kills?”

“What? What do you care?” Nkosi asked.

“Call it morbid curiosity,” Rath shrugged. “I’d just like to hear the truth, just once, from the director of the Janus Group.”

Nkosi arched her eyebrows. “When this is over, you will have the distinction of being the first contractor to ever get paid.”

“And why is that?” Rath asked.

“You know why,” she told him.

“Humor me.”

“If we actually paid off every contractor that beat the odds and made it to fifty kills, this organization would barely turn a profit. So we kill them, and recycle their cybernetic implants … and we make money. Lots of money.”

“How do you live with that lie?” Rath asked her.

“Easily. Unlike you, I sleep soundly knowing what we do. I think society is far better off without a number of ultra-wealthy serial killers running free. No offense.”

“None taken,” Rath told her. “Instead the galaxy is stuck with just one rich sociopath – you.”

If Nkosi was offended, she gave no hint of it.

“Well, I think it’s time we moved to the roof,” Rath said.

“The roof?” Feykin asked.

“I’ll hail an air taxi from the landing pad,” Rath told him. “And if you’ll all accompany me, I’ll give you the location of my two friends once it arrives.”

They rode the elevator to the roof in awkward silence: Rath, Paisen, Feykin, Nkosi, and three guards. Paisen, stony-faced, glared at Rath the entire time. He did his best to avoid looking at her. A brisk wind greeted them when they stepped out of the elevator, whipping across the open roof. The gravel of the roof crunched under Rath’s feet as he led them to the landing pad where Nkosi’s air car was parked. He surveyed it appraisingly, one hand in his pocket.

“I think I’m going to skip the taxi and just borrow your air car.”

“The hell you are,” Feykin told him. “I’ve had enough of this nonsense—”

Nkosi held her hand up for silence. “Relax, Feykin. It’s a small price to pay to have him gone.”

And you probably have a way to track your air car, which would make finding me that much easier, Rath thought.

He held out his hand to Nkosi. “Director. It’s been a pleasure doing business with you.”

Nkosi hesitated, eyeing Rath with disdain. Then she grasped his hand in return.

Game on.

Rath pulled her in hard, yanking the pen out of his pocket with his other hand. In one swift move, he twisted Nkosi, facing her toward the guards and slipping an arm around her neck. His other hand held the pen to the soft spot on her right temple. With a cry of alarm, the guards leveled their rifles at Rath, but he shielded himself behind Nkosi. He could hear her heart beating wildly.

“This is a flimsy pen,” Rath told the guards, “but I’m pretty sure I can punch it through her skull.”

Rath looked over at Feykin. “Tell them to drop their weapons.”

“Do it,” Feykin told them. They complied.

“Uncuff her,” Rath said, nodding at Paisen. The guard closest to her fumbled with the key for a second, then she was free. She picked up one of the auto-rifles, and casually butt-stroked Feykin in the face, knocking him to the ground.

“Get in the car, Paisen,” Rath told her. “No time for that.”

She shot him an angry look.

“There will be more guards on their way – just get in the car,” he repeated. She relented, jogging over to the air car and taking the pilot’s seat.

Rath backed up to the car, pulling Nkosi with him. “You bastard,” she hissed. “The deal is off.”

“Mm,” Rath grunted. “Funny how often deals get broken around here, isn’t it?”

“You can rest assured,” Nkosi promised him, “we’ll have a new message out to all contractors the minute you’re gone. We’ll find you – both of you. I will take every contractor off regular duty and send them after you. I don’t care about the money you stole—”

“The money you owed me,” Rath corrected her.

Nkosi ignored him. “The entire might of this organization will be focused on you. I’ll see that they torture you for the rest of your life.”

“We’ll see,” Rath said. “First, I would worry about the police.”

“The police?” Nkosi frowned.

Rath pushed her away and climbed into the air car, slamming the door. Paisen revved the engine and then threw the car into gear, climbing vertically off the roof.

She shot him a wary look. “Don’t for a second think I’m grateful about what you just pulled – it’s a shitty plan. Sure, we have some cash, and maybe a few minutes’ head start, but I’d trade all that money for the headquarters building burned to the ground. The Group’s still very much alive and kicking, and now they’re pissed. Really pissed.”

“They’re about to have bigger problems. Take us to the spaceport, I’ve got things to take care of.”

“What things?”

“Just fly,” Rath told her. He punched the air car’s control panel, and dialed a number on the speakerphone.

“C4ble, you still with me?”

“Yeah, police net went bonkers about five minutes ago, FYI.”

“Good – Martin must have gotten through to IP.”

“I’d say so. Multiple cars inbound, you want to head southeast to stay outside the cordon they’re setting up.”

“Southeast, thanks.”

Paisen adjusted their course, frowning. “Who is that?”

“A friend of mine,” Rath said. “Same guy who helped me find you. C4ble, how’s the program?”

“I’ve got access to all the systems you listed. The databases are big, but I’m uploading them now. Dasi sent me a note – she already posted your audio visual feed, apparently it went viral. She’s standing by for the database link. I’ve got Beauceron’s number to send it to him, too.”

Exasperated, Paisen threw the car’s auto-pilot switch on, and then turned to Rath. “Just what the hell is going on?” she asked.

* * *

In the control room, a tech found an ice pack for Feykin’s bloodied nose. Altaras hurried over to Nkosi, a worried look on his face.

“Director, we may have a problem.”

“In a minute. Are you tracking 621 and 339?”

“Yes, ma’am. But the police are headed here, responding to a bomb threat in the building. They’ll be here in two minutes.”

“So?” she asked. “Draw some cash, and transfer it to our informants. The police can search the rest of the building, just make sure these floors are not disturbed. Bribe them, Altaras – the same as we always do.”

“Ma’am … the accounts are showing zero balance.”

“What? Which accounts?”

“All of them.”

A tech two rows over stood up, urgently raising his hand. “Supervisor, I’ve got an external user accessing the contractor communications suite!” he shouted.

“What? How?”

“We’ve been breached. I’ve got IT looking for the source now. But the external user is blocking access on our end – we can’t talk to the contractors at all.”

“What are they sending?” Nkosi asked impatiently.

“Wait one,” the tech told her. “It’s to all contractors, looks like a video file. Pulling it up on the main screen.”

The screen showed Nkosi in her office, facing the camera. Rath’s voice emerged from the speakers.

“… but I have one more question,” they heard. “Has the Group ever paid a contractor who reached fifty kills?”

On the screen, the recording of Nkosi frowned. “What? What do you care?”

“Call it morbid curiosity. I’d just like to hear the truth, just once, from the director of the Janus Group.”

“You have the distinction of being the first contractor to ever get paid.”

“And why is that?” the recording asked.

“Oh god …,” Nkosi breathed, watching the screen in horror.

On screen, the recording of her continued: “… if we actually paid every contractor that beat the odds and made it to fifty kills, this organization would barely turn a profit. So we kill them—”

“Shut it down!” Altaras screamed.

“I can’t,” the tech replied, “it’s already been sent. We’re just accessing the file.”

Altaras put his head in his hands. “Jesus Christ. If … maybe if we can get another message out in the next few minutes, we can spin this right. We can say you were lying, under duress—”

The tech broke in, “Sir, I’m trying to access biometrics links and audio visual feeds, but they’re all down. We can’t talk to the contractors, we can’t even monitor them.”

Nkosi grabbed Altaras by the arm. “Get me out of here.”

He looked at her in confusion.

“Now, Supervisor – before the police arrive.”

“I can’t, ma’am: Tower Security has the building on lockdown. Elevators, fire exits – everything’s shut down as an emergency measure because of the bomb threat. Your air car was the last way out of here.”

A tech ran up, and handed Altaras a datascroll. “This was broadcast three minutes ago,” she told him.

Altaras’ face fell. He hit Play on the screen.

“Breaking news,” the reporter on the datascroll read, “a video circulating the web is grabbing the attention of people across the galaxy. The video shows individuals that appear to be associated with the infamous Guild, engaged in a heated debate over blood money. The Guild was once thought to be a mere urban legend, but the footage has now been augmented with a massive data dump, that includes named lists of alleged Guild agents within the government and Interstellar Police. It is appearing more and more likely that the Guild is a real criminal organization, and it is located here, in Wayhaven.”

Altaras dropped the datascroll onto a desk, and locked eyes with Nkosi. In the distance, they heard the sound of approaching sirens.

* * *

Nkosi’s air car settled down on the landing pad next to the Hurasu. Paisen rubbed at her eyes.

“Go over it again. One more time,” she told Rath.

“You don’t trust me?” Rath asked.

“After what you just pulled, probably never again, no.” But the edges of her mouth turned up in the ghost of a smile.

“Okay,” Rath said. “The data drive had a virus on it. I bought it from C4ble for one of my final Group assignments, and I kept a copy, just in case. It’s a mimic program, once you plug the drive in it stays inactive and just observes, but every program you use, it learns to use, too. Do I have that right, C4ble?”

“That’s technically inaccurate in a number of ways, but it’s essentially right,” the hacker replied over the phone.

Rath rolled his eyes. “So Feykin plugged it in, and the program started up. Everything Feykin accessed, C4ble got access to. Their financial accounts, their contractor communications links, and their informant database. He emptied all their accounts, took everything they had. C4ble, how much did we get?”

“Hold on, they’ve got investments all over the place, they were still being transferred last I looked. Okay, here it is.” The line went silent. “Holy. Shit.”

“What?” Rath asked. “How much?”

“One hundred and eighty-two billion dollars. Billion, like, with a ‘b.’ ”

Rath took a deep breath, and then exhaled noisily. He looked over at Paisen. “Split it with you?” Rath grinned. “Fifty-fifty?”

She guffawed.

“Less my ten percent,” C4ble pointed out.

“You’ve earned it,” Rath agreed. “And now we’re even, by the way. You can forget about those kills I owed you.”

“Yeah … I’m definitely taking the money instead. But how the fuck am I going to spend eighteen-point-two billion dollars?” C4ble asked, rhetorically.

“Let’s come back to the money,” Paisen said.

“Okay,” Rath agreed. “I also had Feykin access the informant database. C4ble just copied that, and sent it to Dasi and Beauceron. Dasi was monitoring my feed, and while we were in with Nkosi, I sent her a message asking her to post all the evidence publicly, along with the link to my live feed.”

“You put all of that up on the internet?” Paisen asked.

“Well, Dasi did, but yeah,” Rath said.

“She posted it to the Senate press pool forum,” C4ble told them. “And pinged all of her old press contacts. Every media agency in the galaxy picked it up within minutes.”

“Good call, Dasi,” Rath observed. “Helps to have a PR specialist on your team. C4ble sent all of it to Beauceron, too. I knocked him out before coming after you, but he was dead set on contacting IP, so I imagine that’s what he did as soon as he woke back up.”

“So the cops have all the evidence, and your video feed, too?”

“Yeah, and more importantly, they have the informant list. The entire world knows who takes bribes from or recruits for the Group. Now they can’t hide behind their dirty cops.”

“You slick son of a bitch,” Paisen grinned at him.

“Wait,” Rath told her. “There’s more. After Feykin sent the communication to all contractors saying we were no longer a threat to the Group, C4ble cut off their access. They can’t send another message … only we can.”

“And I did,” C4ble chimed in.

“Right. I was recording everything from the moment I walked into the building. C4ble just sent that recording to every active contractor.”

“So when you asked Nkosi if any contractors had ever been paid …,” Paisen started.

“… I just wanted all the other contractors to hear the truth for themselves, straight from the director,” Rath finished.

Paisen leaned back in her seat. “So even if they re-establish communications, nothing the Group says could convince the contractors to believe them. They’ll never accept new missions, not after learning that ‘Fifty for Fifty’ is all a lie.” She turned to face him, eyes wide. “Rath, they’re going to be pissed, just like us. They’re a huge threat to the Group … the Group’s going to shut them down – kill them remotely via their hemobots, to neutralize the threat.”

“C4ble?” Rath asked.

“Already covered it, just like you asked. I deleted all their tracking and cybernetic links.”

Rath smiled. “Headquarters can’t do anything. Those contractors are free and clear. No audio visual feed, no hemobot links – no way to track them, no way to shut them down.”

“You should see the goddamn circus going on at the Surat Khan Tower right now,” C4ble reported. “I’m watching it on the news. The police are on scene, they have the place surrounded. But the media is there, too. Looks like a few of them got there at the same time the cops did.”

Paisen held up a hand, and counted on her fingers. “They’ve got no money. The entire world knows about them. Their informants and recruiters are about to get arrested. They’ve lost their army of contractors. And they don’t have the senators protecting them anymore, either. They’re just a handful of supervisors and techs – and one really pissed off director – stuck in a building.”

“With the world outside clamoring for justice,” Rath agreed.

“What about Beauceron?” Paisen asked.

“Martin? Martin’s going to go down in history as the one good cop that had the guts to bring down the Guild. I’m hoping that’s enough for him to forgive me for knocking him out again. And breaking my promise to let him arrest me.”

Paisen cocked an eyebrow at him. “You mean to tell me you’re free of the Guild, a fabulously wealthy man, and you’re not going to turn yourself into the authorities?”

“I thought about it …,” Rath confessed.

“Jesus.” Paisen rolled her eyes.

“… but I don’t plan on killing anyone else, and Martin knows that. After today’s work, I think my slate’s pretty much clean.”

A slow smile played across Paisen’s lips. “So, what now?”

“What now?” Rath threw his hands up. “My plan took us up to getting back to the Hurasu; I didn’t think any farther than that. In fact I think I’m done making plans, forever.”

Paisen laughed. “Fine. I’ll take it from here. C4ble, it was a real pleasure.”

“Uh, same here,” the hacker replied. “Kind of the understatement of the century, but thanks, guys. If you ever need anything ….”

“We’ll find you,” Paisen told him, hanging up. She pointed to the Hurasu. “Let’s get on board.”

“I’m thinking a long vacation, somewhere isolated,” Rath said, climbing out of the air car.

“I hear Fusoria doesn’t get many visitors,” Paisen joked.

Rath laughed. “No. Someplace warm.”

Paisen glanced at him as they walked up the Hurasu’s cargo ramp. “You still want to find a doctor when we get off-planet? Get that head erased?”

Rath frowned, and turned to look back at Wayhaven in the distance. “No,” he said, after a time. “I think I’m going to want to remember this.”

25

Dasi signed her name on the datascroll, and then scanned her fingerprint next to the signature. The attendant checked it briefly, then moved down the row of white chairs to the next person. Dasi watched, quietly. The line of chairs reminded her vaguely of gravestones.

That’s because you were just in a cemetery, she told herself. She shifted nervously on her seat. I hope Khyron liked his flowers.

The attendant collected the last signature, checked it, and then shut down the datascroll. He turned to the officer at the front of the room.

“All set,” he said.

“All right,” the police officer said. He stood up.

“On your feet,” he told them.

Dasi stood, along with the dozen other young people in the room.

“You signed the paperwork, but taking the oath is what makes it official. So any of you that are still having second thoughts, this is your final chance.” He paced along the front row, eyeing them individually. “Anyone wants to leave, there’s no shame in doing so.” He stopped in front of Dasi. “Are you sure you want to go through with this?”

“Yes,” she replied, without hesitation.

He continued down the row. “After this point, you’ll report to the Training Academy, and if you succeed there, your duty stations. But many of you will not succeed. Study hard, and make sure you choose the right path.” He surveyed the room, scanning their faces one at a time. “I said the right path, now, not the easy path. The two are rarely the same. Strive to be better, every day, and always uphold the honor of the force. Good luck.”

He came to attention, and raised one hand in the air.

“Raise your right hand, and repeat after me.”

Dasi raised her hand.

“I, state your name.”

“I, Dasi Apter.”

“Do solemnly swear ….”

“Do solemnly swear … that I will never betray my integrity, my character, or the public trust. I will demonstrate the courage to hold myself and others accountable for our actions. I will always uphold my community, and the laws of the Federacy.”

“Welcome to the Interstellar Police, cadets.”

* * *

Beauceron stepped onto the stage, squinting in the bright lights. The hubbub of the press room rose to a fever pitch as he approached the podium, escorted by the Interstellar Police media liaison.

“Detective! A question!”

“Detective Beauceron!”

The media liaison leaned over the microphone. “No prepared statement today, but Detective Beauceron has agreed to field a few questions. I’ll remind you that he’s leading an ongoing investigation into the organization known as the Guild, so anything directly related to that is off the table.”

There was a collective groan from the reporters in the room.

“Everything is related to that!” one of them protested.

The media liaison ignored the shout, stepping aside and allowing Beauceron to come forward. With his short stature, the podium threatened to hide him from view. He blinked, and swallowed nervously.

“Detective! What would you say your big break was in bringing down the Guild?”

The media liaison frowned, but Beauceron cleared his throat. “Our big break? It wasn’t anything I did, so much. I was just lucky – one of the whistleblowers chose me, and I decided to try to help him. And then later, on Fusoria, we were lucky enough to find a clue that led us to Senator Lizelle.”

“A clue? You’ve been very tight-lipped about that part of the story. Care to shed some more light on it?”

“No,” Beauceron replied. “There were other people involved in this case, aside from the two contractors you saw on the web video. But those other people would like their involvement to remain a secret. I think in retrospect they probably had the right idea, staying anonymous. I was somewhat forced into the limelight.”

“You were the one that delivered all of the evidence to the police here on Chennai! How is that forced?”

Beauceron frowned. “I didn’t appreciate how much attention all of this would garner. It was never my intention to take credit for this. The others deserve more credit for their role – the whistleblowers, and Colonel Rozhkov, who sacrificed himself to atone for his past mistakes, and ensure the investigation could continue.”

“How nice is it to hear people call you ‘Detective’ again?” a woman near the back asked.

“It’s nice,” Beauceron admitted. “But it’s not really about the title, or even being reinstated. I’m mostly relieved to be free of the guilt I had.”

“Guilt?” the woman pressed him.

“Yes. A number of years ago, six of my fellow officers were killed by a guildsman back on Alberon. I lived for many years thinking that was my fault, but I know now that that’s not the case. It would be nicer if I could bring those men back, but … failing that, it’s nice to know I brought them some justice. And to have a clear conscience.”

“There was a rumor the whistleblowers sent you some of the money they stole ….”

Beauceron smiled. “They tried to.”

“You sent it back?”

“No,” Beauceron said. “I couldn’t figure out how to do that. But I couldn’t accept it either.”

“So what did you do with it?”

“I donated it to a charity that supports research into rare medical conditions.”

“What are your plans now?”

“Now?” Beauceron shrugged. “Go home to Alberon, and go back to work.”

“The IP public relations office is saying that you turned down a promotion to colonel, and an appointment to head up the Investigations Division at Internal Affairs. Is that true?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Why?”

“Apart from recent events, that’s not what I’m good at. I’ve done homicide my whole career. I’m looking forward to getting back to it.”

“So why turn down the promotion?” a reporter in the front row asked.

“Because colonels don’t solve crimes. That’s what I enjoy doing. Last question, then I have a flight to catch, I’m sorry.”

“What about the contractors who are still out there? The Guild as an organization is defunct, but there are still hundreds, maybe thousands of contractors at large.”

Beauceron locked eyes with the man. “We will find them. We’ll arrest them, and they’ll answer for their crimes.”

“What about the two whistleblowers? The ones you teamed up with?”

“They have crimes to answer for, just like the others. So we’ll be looking for them, too.” He smiled. “But knowing them, I doubt we’ll be lucky enough to find them.”

26

Rath waited patiently at the security entrance to the police station, and when it was his turn, he walked through the scanner without issue. He collected a visitor badge from an automated kiosk in the lobby, tucking it into his pocket before riding the elevator up several floors. He made his way across a noisy office, weaving his way between the desks of police officers. Seemingly by accident, he bumped into an officer heading in the opposite direction.

“Sorry!” Rath smiled, slipping a hand into one pocket.

“No problem,” the officer replied.

Rath turned and walked to a set of fire stairs, where he climbed up four more floors. His face and hair shifted as he climbed, taking on the aspect of the officer he had run into in the office below. When the transformation was finished, he pulled the officer’s Interstellar Police ID badge out of his pocket, and attached it to the front of his suit. At the top of the stairs, he pushed open the door, and entered a small room with a sign marked EVIDENCE: BADGED PERSONNEL ONLY.

An avatar hologram appeared behind a counter mounted along the far wall. “How can I help you, Officer?”

“I’m looking for a piece of evidence from the Lizelle investigation,” Rath replied. “Specifically, a portable 3D printing device.”

“We have several in storage, sir. Multiple items fitting that description were recovered from the wreckage of the airship.”

“No, not from the airship. It would have come from a police vehicle that was involved. An older model, a Createpack A230, with some shrapnel damage.”

The avatar checked the computer database. “Found it, sir. It will just be a second.”

A conveyor belt delivered a cardboard box to the counter. Rath opened the box, and pulled out a battered backpack, its olive drab cloth stained by fluid leaks.

“I’m going to take this down to my desk,” he told the avatar.

“Of course, sir. Please just remain within the building – removing evidence from secure IP installations is a federal offense.”

“Is it?” Rath asked. “Huh. Duly noted.”

He slung the bag over his shoulder, and touched the elevator button. When it came, he pressed the button for the lobby. The elevator stopped en route, and a police officer boarded.

“Hey, Trant,” the officer said, recognizing Rath.

Rath smiled back. “Hey, what’s up?”

The officer exhaled noisily. “Same shit, different day, man.”

“I hear that,” Rath said.

“This whole Guild investigation is just out of control, you know? I don’t mind the overtime, but when does it end?”

“When we catch them all?” Rath guessed.

“Very funny,” the uniformed officer told him. “My lieutenant has decided this is his best shot for a promotion. He’s got it stuck in his head that because they were here on Emerist once, those two contractors are going to be back at any minute.”

“They’d have to be pretty dumb to come back,” Rath observed.

“Right? He’s seeing ghosts everywhere. Suddenly, everyone’s a guildsman in disguise.”

“Are you a guildsman?” Rath asked, jokingly.

“Nope,” the officer chuckled. “Are you?”

Rath winked. “Ya got me.” He held out his hands, offering his wrists to be handcuffed.

The officer laughed, and the doors to the lobby slid open.

“See you around, Trant.”

“Later,” Rath replied.

Outside the police station, he strolled over to a luxury air car idling at the curb. Rath opened the door and sat in the pilot’s seat, sinking into the plush leather.

“Back to the spaceport,” he ordered.

The auto-pilot engaged, and the car lifted off smoothly, joining the air traffic above Emerist’s clouds. Behind the wheel, Rath changed back to a standard cover identity, checking his face in the mirror briefly. Then he set his Forge down on the seat next to him, and patted it with an affectionate smile.

* * *

The contractor finished his bourbon, and set the glass down on the bar.

“Same again?” the bartender asked, walking over.

“No, I’m good.”

“Okay. Let me know,” the bartender told him. He wandered back to the other end of the bar.

The contractor spun the glass slowly in his fingers, frowning uncertainly. He put the glass down, and drummed his fingers on the bar.

“Special update,” the viewscreen above the bar announced. “Our coverage of the Guild scandal continues.”

“This again?” The bartender swore and reached into the air, gesturing at the TV to change the channel.

“Wait,” the contractor said. “Turn it back.”

The bartender sighed, but flicked his fingers in the air again, and the news show returned.

“—stellar Police continue to impound real estate and related assets of the Nkosi family,” the reporter read. “All family members are in custody, but it’s unclear, police say, how much involvement family members had when it comes to the actual management of the Guild, other than Siya herself, who played a pivotal role. What is clear, however, is the extent to which the family as a whole benefitted from the relationship. Property and vehicles seized to date amount to more than three and a half billion dollars.”

The bartender whistled appreciatively.

“Siya Nkosi has been indicted on a multitude of charges including criminal conspiracy, money laundering, and multiple counts of conspiracy to commit murder. Given the weight of evidence posted to the internet, legal experts expect convictions on most charges, and a life sentence. Meanwhile, Senate approval ratings have dropped to record low levels, as more details emerge about the role the three murdered senators played in protecting the Guild, and even directing guildsmen to assassinate political rivals. As for the unknown number of guildsmen still at large … no arrests have been made.”

“Thanks,” the contractor told the bartender. “You can change it again.”

A message notification appeared in the contractor’s heads-up display. He opened it, feeling his heartbeat quicken. A video appeared.

“I’m Contractor 339,” a middle-aged woman told the camera. “This is 621.”

As she spoke, the man and the woman shifted appearance smoothly, and then both held up grey counter bracelets with glowing 50 holograms.

“We made it to fifty kills. But the Group lied to us, and betrayed us.” She smiled. “They paid dearly for that error. And now the Group is gone.”

Beside her, 621 spoke: “We’ve taken the liberty of seizing their funds, including your earnings. Those earnings are now being deposited into each of your expense accounts. One hundred percent of what you earned, no matter how many contracts you fulfilled.”

“Your contract is now terminated,” the woman continued, “which means you have two options. You can use your skills to remain anonymous, and simply live your life, enjoying your newfound wealth.”

“I imagine many of you will choose to do just that,” 621 said. “But if you get bored of it, or you decide you’d like to earn a bit more money … well, we all have a unique skillset. Those skills mean we can excel at things other than killing. Surveillance. Intelligence. Espionage. If you’d be interested in future assignments, reply to this message, and we’ll be in touch.”

The video ended. The contractor glanced both ways down the bar, and then removed a datascroll from his pocket. He logged in to his expense account, and refreshed the balance.

“Bartender?”

“Yes, sir?”

“I think I will have another bourbon. Actually, what’s that black bottle up top?”

“That’s a very expensive whiskey,” the bartender warned him. “It’s mostly for display. I don’t think it’s even been opened.”

“Is it any good?” the contractor asked.

“Yeah, it’s phenomenal.” The bartender stood on a step-stool, and lifted the bottle down, inspecting the label. “Here we go. Yeah, Glenkillie fifty-year barrel-aged.”

“Fifty-year?” The contractor laughed. “That’s perfect. Crack that thing open, and grab a glass for yourself, too.”

* * *

Rath hiked through the villa’s garden, following the flagstone path to the pool at the top of the cliffs. He found Paisen swimming a set of laps, so he wandered to the edge of the cliff, and stood looking out over the sea. The turquoise waters swirled around the rocks below, and out over the horizon, the sun was setting, lighting the clouds with pinks and oranges. Rath took a deep breath, drinking in the salty ocean air and the lush garden odors. Then he smelled a slight hint of a man’s cologne. He turned and found a butler approaching.

“Welcome back, sir. Can I get you anything?”

“Something to eat would be great,” Rath told him. “But make it to go, I’m leaving again tonight.”

“Of course.” The man bowed his head. “Any requests?”

“Surprise me,” Rath said.

“You got it?” Paisen asked. She held onto the edge of the pool, catching her breath.

“Yeah,” Rath said, squatting next to her and setting the Forge on the stones. “I found a repair shop, too – it’s as good as new. And with full canisters.”

She laughed. “It’s just a Forge. You act like it’s your little sidekick.”

Rath shrugged. “How’s the water?”

“Refreshing,” she told him, pulling herself out of the water and picking up a towel. “You going in?”

“It’s tempting,” Rath admitted. “You know, I nearly drowned during Selection, but I like swimming now. There’s something relaxing about it.”

“It’s the weightlessness,” Paisen told him, tilting her head to let the water run out of her ear. “Total freedom of motion.”

“Maybe. Did you send the message?”

“Yup. And C4ble made the money transfers.” She arched an eyebrow at him. “We’re significantly poorer now, you know.”

Rath laughed. “… says the billionaire.”

Paisen frowned in mock anger. “When you start from nothing like we did, every cent matters.”

“They earned that money, just like we did.”

“Bullshit! We did a lot more to earn our money.” She softened. “But they do deserve their shares, you’re right. And there’s plenty left for us.”

The sun touched the horizon, and they stood watching it in silence, until it slipped out of view.

“Reminds me of Fusoria,” Paisen mused. “I used to watch the sunsets every day during Selection. Everything else there was drab, harsh … intimidating. But the sunsets … they reminded me there was something better up ahead.”

“Mm,” Rath said. “I know what you mean. The sunrises, too – I usually had the pleasure of being awake for both, and most of the night in between.”

A notification appeared in Rath’s heads-up display.

“Mikolos has the Hurasu refueled. I better get going.”

“Fly safe,” Paisen told him.

“Bye,” he said. Rath started to walk inside, then stopped and turned. He held the necklace he had bought for Jaymy in one hand.

“Paisen … what do I tell her?”

“The truth,” she said.

Rath chewed the inside of his cheek. “Right,” he said. He stuck the necklace back in his pocket, and slid the Forge over his shoulder.

“Good luck,” Paisen called.

“Thanks,” Rath said, and then he disappeared back down the garden path.

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Text copyright 2015 by Piers Platt

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