“I’m not sure we quite follow, Ms. Kennakris,” Huron explained. “Some people get tagged?”
“Yeah,” Kris answered, oddly disconcerted they didn’t know. “You haven’t run into this?”
“Not that I know of.” He was tapping his xel. “These tags—they’re tracking devices?”
“Uh huh.” Kris took a breath. “I’ve heard they do other . . . stuff—too.”
“And who gets them?”
“Top-tier girls . . . you know—the special ones.” She didn’t want to use the term captain’s bitch in this company. Huron understood.
Quennell was looking intently at her. “How big are these tags? They’re O-chips, right?”
“Yeah. They’re about like this.” Kris held her hand up, thumb and forefinger a few millimeters apart.
“That large?”
“Yeah,” she answered, vaguely defensive—what was weird about that? They knew slavers didn’t use new-gen technology.
“Well, that’s huge!” Quennell threw his hands in the air, happy for the first time that day. “We can do anything with that! Even if they scan the chip itself, we can easily disguise our circuits. They’d have to know almost exactly what to look for to detect them.” He smiled at the table in general, then came back to Kris. “So where do they put these things?”
“Umm . . .” Kris tapped her cheek. “This is the most common place.”
“Nice and simple,” Quennell said happily.
Huron, watching Kris, twitched the left side of his mouth.
“But,” she continued slowly, “if the owner is a real bastard—excuse me, sir—he’ll do a labial tag.” That wiped the smile off Quennell’s face. “It means . . . They think it’s funny.”
Kris couldn’t tell what Quennell was thinking, but Elkins just seemed even more embarrassed. Kris wondered if he’d somehow gotten the wrong idea about what covert ops might entail. Only Huron seemed to have followed her thought. Shifting in his chair he said, “So if a girl shows up with a labial tag, they’re unlikely to be suspicious.”
Kris nodded. “They do worry about CFCs—I mean, plants—being run past them.” She dropped her eyes at the slip of the tongue: CFC was slaver shorthand for counterfeit cunt, but she hoped they didn’t know that. “But—yeah . . . a low-chipped girl with a clean bill of sale, there’s almost no chance they’d suspect that.”
Huron settled slowly back, looking satisfied, but Quennell had just discovered the fly in his ointment. “So . . . if we didn’t know about these things, where are we gonna get one to copy?” He eyed Kris. She didn’t think he was leering, but the glare she gave him made sure. Then she looked down the table at Huron, who was watching her impassively.
“Kym has one.”
* * *
“Damn, will you look at this thing?” Quennell had the schematic of the organic nanochip they’d recovered from Kym up on his console and Huron was looking at it. He just had no idea what he was seeing. “Looks like Kennakris was right about these things being more than just tracking devices. We never recovered one before?”
“I searched the database,” Huron said. “Looks like a few have been found, years ago. Nothing recent, and the ones we found weren’t elaborate.”
“Maybe this is the super-deluxe model.” He circled part of the schematic with his stylus. “Lookie here—know what this is?” The question was clearly rhetorical and Huron didn’t bother to respond. “Nanocyte reservoir. Seeded with a couple of paralytics—not lethal, as near as I can tell, but one of them . . .” He shook his head. “Major neurotransmitter tweak. Can’t imagine how that would feel.” Huron, trying not to, felt a tightness in his gut. “Programmable—can set it to perimeter, distance, environmental . . . even biometrics.”
“Biometrics?”
“Yeah—in case they get frisky with the staff, I guess.”
Huron muttered something harsh under his breath.
“Over here, we have the logs.” Quennell brought them up and started scrolling. “See? Transponder queries, tracking, arming logs, activation logs . . . looks like she was a good girl.” Huron shot him a look but then saw the sarcasm that twisted Quennell’s expression. “Sales and transfers—only the two owners—health records . . . she had the flu when they picked her up—hmm, must’ve uploaded that later. Oh, they built in a contraceptive implant. How thoughtful.”
Damn, Huron thought. They’d have to check Vasquez for that too. What else hadn’t they thought of yet? He blew out a breath and shook his head.
“ . . . the works. Pretty good security too—especially for the arming system. It’s code-locked and uses biometrics. Guess it would really suck if somebody hacked your girl.”
Huron did not mistake his tone this time. “Is that why it wasn’t triggered when we got her?”
“Probably. Maybe the owner got dead before he could arm it.”
“So there’s no dead-man switch on this thing?”
“Dunno—haven’t been through the menus that far.”
“Yeah.” Huron was glad when Quennell blanked the display. “So you can copy it?”
“Oh hell yes—the technology’s at least three generations back. Have to have the foundry rough it up a bit, just in case they do scan it. And we’ll have plenty of room for our special features too.”
“Have to create all the logs, don’t we?”
“Do these guys keep a central database or something? If not, that shouldn’t be too hard. If so, we’re gonna have to get creative.”
“We’re looking into that.”
“Beyond that, I don’t see any issues. Take a few days.” Quennell looked over at Huron and leaned back in his chair, fingers laced. “But y’know . . . I thought I’d seen some fucked-up shit in this job. But this . . .” He didn’t finish the thought. He didn’t need to.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Lunar 1, Tycho Prime
Luna, Sol
Quennell had sandbagged his estimate. Within forty-eight hours, the new organochip was delivered, tested, approved and fitted. Its reservoirs contained stimulants, painkillers, and lethal nanocytes that guaranteed a painless check-out and a sanitized corpse, if it came to that. The special features were tongue switch, blink switch, and biometrically triggered, and there was a low-power UWB symbol-based neural transponder with a voice circuit for dire emergencies.
Vasquez embarked on a stealth corvette bound for Outremeria, there to intercept a slaver packet on its way to Rephidim with Mankho’s latest purchases. (Trolling the dark clouds had panned out, at least in this regard: Trin’s bots had cracked a bundle of VPNs slavers used to make their logistical arrangements.) Where Trin had obtained the stealth corvette’s crew, those who were aware she’d hired them had the sense not to ask. All that mattered was that they were fully equipped to deal with the slavers on the packet, and by the time they arrived to make delivery, they’d be able to impersonate them down to their accents and favorite foods.
Thirty-six hours later, CAT 5 was loading their gear into another corvette whose stealthy character was of an entirely different nature. She was the League Hired Craft Flechette, and by a sudden twist, her owner was also preparing to board. Kris had made up her mind shortly after arriving at Luna that she did indeed want to purchase the yar little boat, if that was possible. It was, though at the last minute, the Admiralty adjustors balked at selling it to her for scrap value. That would have killed the deal, but for the fact that CAT 5 discovered the need for a fast, unattributable and readily available means of transport.
The original plan had been to employ another stealth corvette, but no vessel was perfectly stealthy, especially in low orbit, so the team would have to deploy from an assault shuttle—a risky proposition. During the Lacaille operation, the Nedaeman corvette had been detected and unhappily, they lacked a firm estimate of Tirana’s surveillance capabilities: they might be as good as Lacaille’s, or even better. On the other hand, a slaver entering a system much frequented by slavers (and few others) was only to be expecte
d, and what better way to impersonate a slaver boat than to use a real one?
So the deal went through, at slightly below market value, and a little later that PM, Kris inked a contract to hire the craft back to PLE-SOCOM (Pleiades Special Operations Command, under whose auspices the mission was being run) on generous terms for a Terran month, fully indemnified and with a guaranteed option of extending it another thirty days. Thus, the CEF was spared risking a very expensive bit of hardware, and Kris left the table with a new corvette and some additional padding in her bank accounts. That night, a team of carefully chosen engineers set about adding clamps for an assault shuttle and tweaking its grav-plant profile and electronic signatures on the off chance someone on Rephidim might have the ill-fated Chiller Down in a database.
That Kris was going to accompany CAT 5 on her own boat was the result of developments that began when Mariwen’s brother had interrupted their meeting to hand Huron a chip. Antoine Rathor worked for the Office of TransStellar Issues, the Terran security organization that dealt with smuggling, slaving and terrorism by non-state actors. No official conduit existed for sharing information between a Terran security department and PLE-SOCOM (or anyone in the CEF), but where officialdom failed, personal ties might suffice, especially when a retired Speaker was involved, and CNO had provided an MOU with conveniently vague wording.
The chip was a dump of all the info OTI had on Mankho and his known associates, and Antoine Rathor had also privately communicated to Huron during their brief conversation that they expected an update from a trusted source ‘very shortly’. In this case, very shortly was the AM before Kris finalized the purchase of Flechette, and the update was that since the Lacaille raid, Mankho had started using doubles. As Kris had told them, Mankho had a horror of surgery, denying him biosculpting as an option to confound his enemies, but creating doubles was almost as good—in some ways, perhaps better—and he had no lack of ‘raw material’ to work with.
How many doubles had not been ascertained, nor the exact whereabouts of all of them, but the source was confident that a number were with him on Rephidim. A good double could deceive any casual observer and even most acquaintances, and Corporal Vasquez had only imagery to go on. But no double could deceive someone who knew the subject intimately: the way they walked and stood and moved, their expressions and how they gestured when they spoke, could never be perfectly copied. And Kris, although she’d been in Mankho’s company for just less than two local weeks, knew him as few people did, and in ways fewer still would forget, even if they lacked Kris’s highly retentive memory.
That attaching her to the operation was the obvious solution did not mean it was a simple or easy one. Kris was not close to being field rated: what she knew of ground combat consisted of her unarmed combat training and the introductory small arms classes she’d taken. About such things as deploying from orbit, covert reconnaissance, small unit infantry tactics, fireteam drills and the myriad other operational details CATs took for granted, she had no clue. The expected length of the transit—two Terran weeks—was precious little time to polish what skills she had.
It was, however, more than no time, and she would not be called on to do much more than keep up, stay low, and follow orders. She would also have to understand a few of the rudiments of what CATs did and how, but as for that, a willing mind could achieve surprising results in fourteen days.
Whether they were dealing with a willing mind or a reluctant one was unclear. Since returning from the Hydra, Kris had become even more withdrawn. When Huron met privately with Yu, neither of them were under any illusions about the risks of bringing her on the mission. But they also knew they were facing a digital choice: there was just no fallback at this point. Without Kris to finger Mankho, they would have to scrub. So they weighed the risks and resolved to approach her, though Huron waited until after the purchase of Flechette was wrapped up to do it. In spite of her evident pleasure at the deal, she acquiesced with a look so wooden as to give him pause—an unconsidered decision, almost, as if accepting the inevitable.
The extent to which Huron or Yu guessed what lay behind the stolid expression and stiff, clipped response they did not advertise, but they certainly didn’t think it was trepidation, and they were right. What Kris’s sullen manner had previously attempted to mask was a seething frustration that, having found Mankho—having had to recall and explain all he’d said and done to her, down to the feel of his skin and the way he smelled when he got excited—she was to be left behind, consigned to the sidelines, an impotent distant spectator, while people with no personal stake in the issue did the real work.
As the days crawled by, her desire to be in at the kill hardened into a need, a physical pain deep in her core that she tried to keep off her face but couldn’t keep out of her voice, leading to short, sharp answers and failing to meet people’s eyes.
What she endeavored to conceal now—a more difficult thing by far—was the surge of elation she’d felt when Huron broached the possibility of bringing her along, an emotion beyond anything in her experience. The echoes were with her still, and the trepidation she did feel—that if they knew, they might have second thoughts and leave her behind, after all—made for an unhealthy brew, always just below a boil.
And they might have—Kris had no idea, for they were determined to be as impenetrable as she—but they also might not. They knew, to a degree she did not appreciate, that when infiltrating Hell, bringing a native guide along could make all the difference.
* * *
Not fully aware of her new status as a native guide, Kris sealed her bag, a smaller bag than usual because it contained only her personal effects (her uniforms and other kit had already been sent ahead), and took it out into the main living area where Kym was looking at the console with an expression of settled discontent. Dropping it by the entrance, Kris tried to think of something appropriate to say.
In point of fact, she’d been trying to think of something appropriate to say since she started packing. In the past few weeks, Kris had come to realize she liked Kym—liked her a lot—and this was where they would part ways. Until now, Kris’s life had not afforded many opportunities for saying goodbye, and never with someone she actually liked. She had some vague ideas on the subject, mostly gleaned from old video entertainments: the goodbyes were always heartfelt and rather overlong, and no matter how final they were presented as being, some glaringly improbable circumstance always seemed to bring the principals back together at the end. How exactly this mapped to real life, Kris didn’t know, but she had a strong suspicion that it didn’t.
“How’s it going?” she asked—a feeble attempt at buying a few more moments. “Finding anything?”
Kym shrugged. She’d been getting info from the placement center in the Office of Colonial Affairs’ Repatriation Bureau for the past week on resettlement options, and while she studied them all diligently, so far none had any degree of appeal. This was hardly surprising: the Bureau’s matching algorithms were not well adapted to someone of Kym’s background.
Fortunately, there was no hurry. The exception decree they’d applied for had been granted to the extent of providing placement assistance, and that carried with it a small payment, good for about three-month’s living expenses. Commander Wesselby had arranged for a more generous ex gratia payment through PLESIG, which Huron’s father had then augmented with a disbursement from some particular funds within Terran intelligence that he retained a degree of control over.
Between them, those payments approximately equaled the repatriation settlement Kym could have expected if she were a League citizen, but the total was, in fact, somewhat more. This was because Kris, in ignorance of the particulars of those disbursements, had arranged for Kym to receive a modest monthly stipend, paid for out of the proceeds of her own prudently invested repatriation funds. The end result of all this benevolence was not to make Kym rich (though indeed it added up to wealth far beyond any thoughts she may have had), but to give her a long breathing s
pace before committing herself to anything. Kris knew, of course, that Kym, while deeply appreciative of the kindness she was being shown, wasn’t so much interested in breathing space as not living on a moon. She hoped this wouldn’t incline Kym to be overly hasty.
Wanting to put the best possible face on it, Kris said, “Well, you’ve got plenty of time. This place is leased through the end of next month—it’s all paid up. No worries.” She had already explained that, but given her own unfamiliarity with financial matters and the sometimes embarrassing episodes it had caused (and continued to cause, if the truth be told), she wasn’t sure it had really sunk in.
“I know that”—pointedly informing her that it had, indeed. “An’ I’m gonna pay you.”
“Kym, it’s already paid—”
“You paid it,” Kym insisted, firing a scowl over her shoulder. “You’re bein’ too nice again.”
“Yeah. Okay.”
“How much?”
Kris stepped to the console, leaned over Kym’s shoulder and opened her accounts screen. She showed Kym the bank draft for the lease amount and what the remainder came to. Kym, lips compressed into a studious frown, opened her own accounts, and under Kris’s guidance, stroked the funds across.
“There,” Kym pronounced with great satisfaction.
“Yeah. Thanks. Um—” Kris checked her xel. It was getting late. “I—ah—gotta go. You take care of yourself, okay?”
Returning to the entryway, she leaned down for her bag and heard the sound of Kym practically flinging herself out of the chair barely in time to brace for the impact. Kym’s slim arms came crushingly around her waist and Kym’s face was mashed into her breast.
“Gonna come back, right?” A softly piercing voice, muffled by the cloth of her fatigues.
In her hurry of spirits, Kris wondered if Kym could have possibly forgotten that after this op, she was returning directly to the Academy and wouldn’t leave it again until the end of the next term, seven months from now.
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