by Eyal Kless
“You’ll change your mind soon . . .”
“No Skint.”
I thought I caught a look of appreciation passing through Jakov’e eye, but he only said “Suit yourself,” and turned his attention to the thick cable that now stretched from Vincha’s skull to a machine. “Is she ready?”
“Patience, please . . .” River was too preoccupied to bother with egos, and Jakov chose to ignore his insolence for now. “Okay, Vincha,” River finally said. “I’m going to turn the Comm on and run some tests. You remember how it goes . . .”
Vincha nodded and grimaced but didn’t say anything.
Jakov interjected, “By the way, I made sure your Comm device lacks offensive capabilities, so don’t waste your energy trying to hack into other people’s systems.”
A faint smile touched Vincha’s lips, but it disappeared as she suddenly convulsed, shouting in pain.
Thankfully, the pain seemed to last for only a heartbeat. River turned some dials, and Vincha collapsed back onto the med chair. “Rust, I’m sorry,” River apologized. “I didn’t see that one coming. Won’t happen again. Now, if you’re okay, I’m going to first manually dial you up to some channels, and you tell me if you hear anything and if it needs adjusting. Then we are going to go through your spectrum one by one.”
The process took time and was nothing but tedious. A few found a quiet place to rest, and two guards dozed in a corner. Jakov and his burly, masked bodyguard stayed next to Vincha the entire time, so leaving her side felt like a betrayal, especially with my new position as Associate LoreMaster.
“Right, Vincha, almost done.” Sweat was pouring down River’s brow as he busied himself with the instruments. “I want you to start channelling by yourself. The cable I attached will transmit what you hear to the speakers.”
Vincha raised a trembling hand to her temple. “I’ve got a killer headache,” she mumbled. “Not sure . . .”
“We’ll start with the easy ones.” River began reading numbers and letters.
Vincha closed her eyes. We all gathered around her as the speakers whistled and crackled.
Most of the channels were either dead or full of awful, unnatural noises. We stumbled upon two ShieldGuards gossiping, but other than that, it was a pretty monotonous affair.
“Okay Vincha, now let’s try to find the channel.”
River began reading the letters, but Vincha whispered, “Maybe later, maybe I’ll rest, my head . . . hurts.”
Jakov suddenly leaned over and grasped Vincha’s chin with his human hand. She opened her eyes wide, and the restraints creaked as she tried to move away. Jakov dangled a small leather bag in front of her eyes.
“We don’t have time for beauty sleep. I will stuff Skint up your nostrils if I need to.”
“No,” Vincha whispered, “no Skint, please, I can do it.”
The bag disappeared and Jakov straightened up. “Fine.” He nodded to River, who resumed reading the numbers.
Vincha closed her eyes again, but it was obvious she was straining. A drop of blood appeared under her left nostril and slowly dripped down over her cheek bone.
“You just missed it.” River was trying his best. “It’s a rusty thin bandwidth, try reaching it from the t—”
And just like that, the room was filled with music I had never heard before. It was glorious and mesmerizing. Everyone in the room listened in silence.
Vincha took a ragged breath between each syllable: “Bit . . . of . . . En.” It was the music she’d shared with Rafik at the Hive. River leaned over and wiped away the blood that was flowing freely from Vincha’s nose. I tried to listen to the patterns Rafik had talked about when he first heard the music back in the Hive, but I was too excited to concentrate. The music, as beautiful as it was, meant only one thing: we were no longer dealing with a theory. This was really happening.
The music faded and a voice filled the room. It was a child’s voice. “Vincha,” it said.
She turned her head to the speakers. “Rafik.” A tear dropped from her eye.
“Six,” he said, “two, seven, east. Four, six, nine, north. I repeat . . .”
“Write it down,” Jakov commanded. I fumbled for a scroll and a pen, mouthing the numbers to myself until I copied the numbers, which were obviously waypoints. Jakov unfolded a large, pre-Salvationist-era map on top of the weapon crates.
The message and the music repeated five more times before Vincha lost consciousness.
“Here it is.” Galinak pointed at the map. “Almost at the far edge of the Valley. I mean look”—he moved his finger—“the Hive used to be here . . . the broken Long Tube stop is here . . . this is a long trip.”
“Well,” Jakov straightened up, “it’s where we’re going. Let’s find out if this invitation is real.”
“The voice was that of a young boy,” I said. “Vincha recognised it as Rafik’s, but he was a boy fifteen years ago. If he’s alive, that can’t be his voice.”
Jakov tilted his distorted face at me. “Yeah, but we’re going anyway. I promised Harim you could tag along. He assured me you can handle your metal and keep your mouth shut. I can see he was wrong about the second part. I hope for your sake he was right about the first.”
This was probably the only chance I had to get on Jakov’s good side, but I still pressed on: “Well, maybe my mind would be more at ease if you told me why you’re doing this. The guards, the weapons, the antigrav suits”—I pointed at Vincha—“all of this. And now you want to go to Tarakan Valley, of all places, where Trolls are Lizard fodder? I heard you landed a huge sum for the Puzzler boy. So why—”
Jakov took a threatening step towards me. “This is none of your rusting business. I promised not to kill you, but I could still break a few bones.” He took another step towards me, and in a blink of an eye Galinak was standing between us.
“If you’ll excuse me, sir.” The politeness in Galinak’s voice surprised me. “It’s not that we don’t appreciate that you have business matters you want to keep private—we certainly do—but Twinkle Eyes here is my direct employer, and I simply can’t have anything happen to him at this moment. It would be unprofessional.”
In hindsight this was almost comic relief, seeing as a dozen guards had taken position around us, but to his credit Jakov eased the tension with a small hand gesture.
“Twinkle Eyes,” he said. “That’s a nice little nickname. You want to share your real one with me?”
“Twinkle Eyes will do.” There was almost no tremble in my voice. “I’ve grown to like it.”
“Fine, Twinkle Eyes, I’ll humor you this once, if it makes you feel any better. It is true that the sum I got for the Puzzler was high, but in my line of work there are a lot of expenses, and let’s say I’ve made a few unwise, costly business decisions. Being the first person in more than a decade to enter the City within the Mountain and perhaps establish a connection could be very profitable. The rest you’ll need to figure out by yourself. Are you in?”
Did I have a choice? Could I have walked away? I never found out. I knew I was going to see this through when Vincha was strapped to the med chair.
Jakov turned to River. “You’re competent,” he said, “which is something I appreciate. If you join us you’ll get a sixth and tenth pick of the loot and a fair share of the rest.”
River tilted his head. “Fourth and sixth.”
They agreed on fifth and eighth. Knowing River, I think he would have come for free.
“I can’t come,” Vincha whispered from the med chair.
“My dear, you made history once.” Jakov walked closer to her. “Be a part of making history again. And anyway, I brought a mutual friend to keep us company—you could use the time to get reacquainted.”
On a cue from Jakov, the burly, masked guard who was standing next to him walked forward and took off his mask.
Vincha gasped in surprise. “Bayne.”
“Hello, Vincha.” Bayne moved his hand through his white hair. “Been lookin
g for you for some time. I think you owe me an explanation.”
64
They tied Vincha up in the back of the Duster, gave me a power rifle and a blanket, and left me to guard her, probably just to keep me out of their way. The crew went ahead to scout.
It was freezing cold in the mountains, and Jakov had only enough heat suits for himself and his crew. I left the power rifle leaning against the front seat and walked to the back of the Duster to check on Vincha. I found her trembling from the cold. Without thinking I threw my own blanket to her, a move I regretted almost immediately as the coldness slammed into my exposed body. My gallantry rewarded me with nothing more than a small nod from the ex-Salvationist. She wrapped the blanket around herself using her free hand.
Vincha kept mostly to herself throughout the journey, but every time I felt sorry for her I remembered our first encounter and the feeling of the cold blade of her combat knife pressed against my skin. If Vincha was certainly waiting for an opportunity to bolt, I was not planning on giving her that opening. I’d caught her and Bayne speaking several times—heated conversations. The way the burly Troll looked at Vincha left no doubt; he was still hurt, which means he still had feelings for her. I figured that if Vincha could convince Bayne that she’d only sent him away from the outpost for his own safety, he could be turned, but I kept my ideas to myself. No point in stirring a hornets’ nest unless you absolutely had to.
Jakov got us out of the city through the sewers. The next two days we hiked to a safe area and waited for four Dusters, each equipped with a mounted rail gun, to show up. It had been a long journey since then, and thankfully uneventful, but there were plenty of tense moments. All it took was one patrol to spot us, and there was enough evidence along the way to prove that the Council was casting a wide net. The more I thought about it, the more insane this mission seemed.
There were so many unknown factors that taking the risk seemed almost illogical. Sure, there was a chance, an off chance, that we’d cross Tarakan Valley unharmed, reach the city, penetrate the inner sanctum without a Puzzler, find the boy, now most likely a man, and uncover a new cache of Tarakan artifacts, but there was no doubt in my mind that this mission was very dangerous. Jakov’s motivation was obvious—he took a chance for hard metal—but I was struggling with the reasons I myself was so eager to go.
The only answer I could think of was what made the Salvo-novels I’d read in my youth so attractive. It wasn’t the explicit sex and violence—although I have to admit they gave me plenty of inspiration on lonely nights—it was opening a door and finding out what was hiding behind it. We read books to solve a mystery, and the more I heard about Rafik, the more I was intrigued, even obsessed, with finding out what had happened and why. So here I was, on a suicidal mission but with an actual chance to unveil the mysteries of Tarakan. Bukra’s balls, if there ever was a book worth dying for, this was it.
My thoughts went to my LoreMaster. We had parted ways, probably for good, and as I stood shivering near the Duster I wondered if they’d caught him yet, and if he still believed that all of this sacrifice was worth it. I wondered if humanity was worth it, and at that point in time I wasn’t sure.
The cold made daydreaming and philosophical reflections difficult, so I moved a little closer to where Vincha was crouching, her hand cuffed to a metal part of the Duster. From a glance at her exposed arm I knew that if they didn’t get back soon it looked like it would cause a nasty cold burn. She looked up at me like an animal caught in a trap. I kept a safe distance.
“How are you?” I asked, not expecting an answer, but I guess my manners had some kind of effect on her.
“I need to pee,” she said through clenched teeth.
That caught me off guard, although obviously, it was a natural request. “I’m sorry, I can’t help you with that,” I said.
“I don’t think I can hold it much longer.”
“I’m not letting you go, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Come on, Twinkle Eyes, do a lady a favor. You’ve seen Bayne take me to the side and we came back nice and peaceful.”
“I can’t do it.”
“You mean you won’t.” She sighed. “What if I answered your question?”
“Which question?”
“The one you’re dying to ask. Come on . . . you’ve been twinkling at me for days now. How about you ask me and I’ll tell you, and after that you take me to a nice mound of snow so I can pee in peace?”
I knew this might be a trap, but we were negotiating again, and I had an edge. The temptation was simply too great.
“How about I help you take off your pants now and you answer my question later.”
She twisted her face in anger, but I did offer her assistance without a precondition which gave her the possibility of backing out of the deal, and gave me the moral high ground.
“All right,” she said, “but if your hands go anywhere they shouldn’t I’ll bite your nose off.”
“I assure you Vincha, I have no intention—”
“Yeah, yeah, mister twinkly knight, the buckle is right here, you have to twist, like that . . . no, the other way . . . no . . . use both hands, rust brain . . . right . . . now pull here . . .”
It happened in a flash. Her free hand twisted me around and snaked under my neck and under my chin as her legs wrapped themselves around me. I tried to heave up, but she pulled me down and towards her with her legs.
“Vincha, no . . .” I gasped but she paid me no heed and pushed her head against mine, choking me with the pressure. I was still conscious, but only because her choke hold was with one arm. She was pulling me and herself towards her cuffed hand. I was not an expert, but knew enough to realise that if she locked hands I would be out in a heartbeat.
“Vincha,” I gasped, “it’s useless . . . I don’t have a key . . .”
She wasn’t listening. Perhaps she wanted to look for herself. I bit her arm as hard as I could, tearing through the fabric of her shirt, and felt her twitch and release the choke hold just enough for me to make a desperate reverse head butt. I think I hit her cheekbone or something, because her legs loosened and I was able to turn so that my face was suddenly buried in her chest. She pushed me down with her arm and wrapped her legs around me again, this time around my neck, but something in me, some animal instinct, came alive. I pushed her legs away with both hands, and suddenly I was free and on top of her. That was my chance to escape, but this time I did not get up. Maybe it was that last betrayal that took me over the edge. I punched her in the chin, once, then several more times, shouting profanities as I rained blows on the CommWoman. The third punch did most of the damage, even though she rolled with it. When she finally covered her head with her hand I stopped myself from hitting her again and fell backwards and away from her.
She was almost under the Duster, breathing hard. Slowly she pulled herself back to a sitting position, her face bleeding. She suddenly burst out laughing, and I saw that her teeth were red. “Well, Twinkle Eyes, you have some metal in you after all.”
“I only wanted to help you.” Even as I said it, the words sounded childish.
I stood up slowly and she eyed me with a warrior’s calculation, but I was not planning on resuming the fight. Somehow, even though she attacked me first, I still felt ashamed for hitting a cuffed woman. Besides, I had a slight suspicion that I might have broken my right hand.
She looked at me and said, “Okay, I guess you earned your question. Ask away.”
“Nakamura . . .” I finally said. “Do you really believe he could predict the future?”
Vincha sighed and rolled her eyes. “I was close enough to him to know that he was insane. I’d seen him kill without provocation, and I know he was convinced he could predict the future. Well, if releasing several thousand Lizards and dying in the process means you are some kind of oracle bringing salvation to mankind, so be it. I’m just glad he’s dead.”
“Why did he keep you alive? He killed everyone.”
“But he had his own logic. He murdered his crew because he knew sudden death was better than being torn apart by Lizards. Your story is incomplete.”
She laughed, genuinely, this time. “You are a sensitive interrogator, aren’t you, Twinkle Eyes? Yes, there was more to his final speech in the City within the Mountain, but I saw no point in repeating his babble. If you’re that curious, I’ll tell you. He gave a stupid little speech saying how he knew from infancy that his life would be full of pain and suffering, but that his death would be the beginning of our salvation. That the Tarakan empire must be awakened and that the Puzzlers were the key. A load of rust. He said that I should give birth to my daughter, but then I should return to the City within the Mountain and bring her with me—and should I not do it, her fate would cause a second Catastrophe. That’s the gist of it. He let me live, and I ran and never looked back. Every day that I stayed away from Tarakan Valley was further proof that he was one insane, deluded freak who convinced himself that his suffering had meaning. Yes, I have a daughter, and she ain’t here, and I ain’t bringing her to the City within the Mountain even if you kill me. Besides, she wouldn’t be of help to anyone.”
“Your daughter is unmarked?”
Vincha looked at me straight in the eyes. “Yeah, funny that. It’s rare that it happens when both parents are tattooed, but her life is better for it. I left her with some good people.”
I had to admit, she was good. I would have believed her had I not known the truth. “When I was chasing your shadow, I actually visited the village you gave birth in,” I said. “I know your daughter was marked from birth. That’s rare, and her foster parents refused to take her because of that. They said her fingers were marked as well as her head.”
Vincha cursed for a while and called me a liar, then a gullible fool, and then she got imaginative. I paid her no attention.
Did I really believe Nakamura could predict the future? No, and his actions were disastrous. But it was quite amazing how he managed to stay one step ahead of everyone. When Nakamura sent Vincha to the outpost to find “a young Puzzler” way before Rafik was even with the Keenans—was it a lucky twist of fate or a premonition?