The Paratwa (#3 in the Parawta Saga)

by Christopher Hinz

"Black-market offerings,” Colette lied. “From Sirak-Brath."

  Ghandi knew that the majority of CPG's high-tech playthings had a far more esoteric origin: Theophrastus, the Ash Ock technological wizard. But Blumhaven could not know that. The E-Tech councilor remained a mere fragment of the whole, an almost wholly unconscious element within the intricate tangle of Ash Ock schemes. Blumhaven was unaware of Colette's true nature, blind to the real goals of the deadly sunsetter, oblivious that his actions were leading the Paratwa toward ultimate victory.

  Unconsciousness as a way of life, thought Ghandi. Doyle Blumhaven did not realize just how lucky he was.

  The councilor's face darkened at the mention of the Sirak-Brath underground. “In the future, Colette, may I suggest that you exercise extreme caution when dealing with those black marketers? Edward Huromonus's action/probe has specifically targeted them as the prime generators of E-Tech corruption."

  "Indeed,” said Colette, smiling faintly. “And Edward Huromonus has certainly turned out to be an enemy of formidable proportions."

  "The problem with Huromonus,” muttered Blumhaven, “is that he doesn't know where to draw the line. He's even begun to dig into my personal finances."

  "Rash of him."

  Doyle shook his head. “I may have been a fool for putting Huromonus in charge of this action/probe. The man has no sense of restraint."

  Colette laughed bitterly. “Restraint! Rich, Doyle, rich indeed! Restraint—the word conjures images of someone who would deliberately bind his own hands prior to a fistfight. I ask you now, Doyle, as I've asked you in the past: did you truly think that this Edward Huromonus was the sort of man who would place limitations upon such an investigation? Did you truly believe that you would remain above his scrutiny?"

  "I needed the action/probe, to look good,” argued Blumhaven. “You know that. You can't imagine the battering that E-Tech's been taking over these past few years. Why, half the populace was beginning to believe that the organization is totally corrupt! And those damned freelancers—they crucify us every chance they get! I'd have cut my own throat if I'd permitted another whitewash."

  For a moment Colette stood silently, her gaze wandering across Doyle Blumhaven's face with that same chilling intensity that she had earlier displayed toward Ghandi. “You did manage to set up the raid without complications?"

  Blumhaven nodded. “The raid will take place according to your plans."

  "And your E-Tech Security force knows that it will be rendezvousing with the other car?"

  Blumhaven scowled. “Yes ... but I still don't understand why the ICN has to be involved—"

  "The ICN will be there to act as neutral observers.” Colette turned toward the door and clapped her hands three times in rapid succession.

  With a sharpness of movement that took Ghandi's breath away, two figures slipped into the room. Two males—twins—each garbed in translucent chiffon gowns, naked underneath, their hands hidden behind their backs, their gowns clasped by identical crystal brooches shaped like spiders, with each of the six legs of the arachnids terminating in a phosphorescent emerald.

  Blumhaven's gaze fell immediately to their crotches, to engorged cocks pressing up through narrow slits in the silken material, protruding like weapons. The councilor's pudgy face seemed to ripple, forming a patchwork quilt of desire, unreserved, unselfconscious, untainted by the presence of Ghandi and his wife.

  "All things considered,” said Colette, “you've done well, Doyle. The scales have tipped in your favor. Huromonus was a mistake, but Adam Lu Sang has more than compensated for your error.” Her voice fell to a whisper. “Reward yourself for your efforts. Feast ... until your body achieves its own repose."

  Ghandi, swallowing a spasm of fear, willed himself to take a step backward. He could not. Muscles seemed frozen.

  The twins with the ramrod penises had names, Ky and Jy, but they remained aspects of the one, the Ash Nar, two-thirds of Calvin, the murderous tripartite Paratwa.

  Blumhaven leaned forward, dropped to his knees, slithered up to the tways, took hold of a stiff cock in each hand, rubbed his face against the delicate fabric that caressed their hips. Colette touched the wall control; now the window glass clenched, mutating rapidly from clarity to opaqueness.

  Slowly, the Ash Nar twins raised their arms above their heads. Ky opened his palm, revealing a compressed cube: a smart tarp. Four hands, working in concert, effortlessly and silently unveiled the ethereal fabric until it formed a tent shadowing the E-Tech councilor.

  Blumhaven did not notice the activity above him. His attention shifted to the left, to Jy, to the tway's waiting penis. Doyle's lips, on the verge of attachment, quivered; his tongue sampled air.

  Run, Doyle! thought Ghandi selfishly, knowing that he did not really care about Blumhaven's life but desperate to escape being a witness, escape another jolting inner quake of the microbes, the externalized turmoil of his endless inner struggle.

  "A devouring fever,” murmured Colette.

  From the stairwell in the anteroom, a beam of harsh black light snaked through the doorway, circled the veranda twice, then whipped around Doyle Blumhaven's throat like a noose. The councilor's eyes bulged wide; for a timeless instant, his cheeks quivered, baby-fat flesh parading into tantrum as the body realized it had been cheated of all rewards.

  Ky and Jy released the tarp. It fell onto the councilor just when the black beam crushed inward, garroting Blumhaven, instantaneously severing his spinal column and neck muscles. The tarp, now sensor-driven, enveloped Blumhaven's decapitated head and torso, neatly interlocking itself around his feet. Two hundred-plus pounds of enshrouded animal matter spilled to the floor.

  Ky and Jy, in tandem and without touching themselves, ejaculated, spraying the body bag as it rolled onto the carpet. Semen coalesced in odd little splotches on the still quivering corpse, forming mushy tears that ran down between folds of fabric.

  It took another few seconds for the councilor's disjointed systems to achieve entropy. Blumhaven's leg kicked once and then the body was still.

  Ghandi's muscles unlocked. He managed a feeble step backward, toward the massive pane of the shrouded window.

  "Well done,” praised Colette.

  Ghandi swallowed, finding his voice. “Why ... why Blumhaven?"

  "Necessary,” she replied, as if that one word of explanation totally sufficed.

  Ky and Jy slipped their spent cocks back into their chiffon gowns, then knelt on both sides of Blumhaven and heaved the body bag to chest height. A moment later, the third tway, Calvin himself, namesake of the trio, slithered through the door. He wore white leotards, heavy black boots, and a baggy green blouse imprinted with twentieth-century cartoon figures, each deformed into various alphabet caricatures. In his right palm rested the telltale egg-shaped weapon—the Cohe wand—its needle shaft protruding like an ancient antenna, poised to receive.

  "Dump the body in-colony,” ordered Colette. “Be as ceremonious as you like.” She faced the taller tway. “Are you certain Blumhaven was not followed?"

  Tway Calvin grinned and raised his left hand. Holotronic letters, green as the emerald spider brooches worn by his other tways, glistened into razor-sharp words inches above his fingertips.

  OUR LATE ASSOCIATE WAS NOT FOLLOWED. I TRACKED HIM CAREFULLY. Calvin lowered his hand and carefully replaced the Cohe wand in the slip wrist holster beneath his sleeve.

  "You've done well, Calvin. In fact, excellence has marked your efforts over the past few weeks."

  Tway Calvin's cheeks boiled into a smile. Ky and Jy, holding the body bag, began to hop up and down, as if facial expressions alone could not express their pleasure. A loose floorboard squeaked.

  "Latest status of the skygene infections?” asked Colette.

  Calvin extended his hand. POSITIVE INFECTIONS NOW CONFIRMED IN ALL BUT TWELVE COLONIES. IF YOU WISH, I COULD DISPOSE OF THE REMAINING COURIERS IN ONE LAST MASSACRE.

  Colette gave a thoughtful nod. “I suppose that at this point, th
e methodology of courier destruction is no longer of great consequence. You may use your own discretion."

  Ky and Jy stomped wildly. Staring at the two sets of legs, Ghandi was reminded of a video he had once seen of a wild Earth stallion desperate to escape its corral.

  LONG LIVE THE ORDER OF THE BIRCH, ordained Calvin's fingers. His smile bloomed.

  Colette turned to Ghandi. “My love, you surprise me. I would have thought that it was obvious that Doyle was becoming too great a liability."

  "I hadn't realized,” Ghandi heard himself mumble.

  "Yes. I see.” She smiled warmly. “At any rate, if we've been reading E-Tech's internal politics correctly, Edward Huromonus will most likely be appointed as the temporary director of the organization. He is far more rational than Doyle was. Once Meridian's ultimatum is presented to the Council, Huromonus will likely be swayed into accepting the most logical solution to the dilemma. The Colonies will be ours."

  One of Calvin's tways chuckled as the trio steered the body bag through the doorway and into the stairwell. Ghandi and Colette were left alone on the veranda.

  She moved to the control panel beside the window, clenched the glass back into its transparent mode. The storm had abated; only stray bullets of white remained to waffle the skies. She gazed silently into the grayness.

  Ghandi stared at her profile, grimly wondering if she had merged with her other half, become Sappho. The eyes of Colette's Ash Ock monarch would reflect a light that did not originate in this room; the eyes of Sappho would reveal a presence that seemed utterly alien.

  But when she spoke, Ghandi's anticipation—his dread—melted away. She remained Colette.

  "Come to the bedroom, my love. I desire you."

  "I desire you,” he echoed.

  O}o{O

  "Anything new on Blumhaven?” asked Nick.

  The Lion sat down, squeezing himself into a narrow space between the midget and a towering set of molded equipment racks. This spare bedroom, in the A-frame house at the retreat, seemed smaller to the Lion each time he entered it. Nick and Adam Lu Sang acquired new computer gadgetry with the devotion of climate-conscious squirrels.

  "No real updates,” answered the Lion. “He's been missing for almost a full day now, but about the only thing that E-Tech seems willing to admit is that he entered that history library in Pocono after telling his Security people to take the afternoon off. When his chauffeur came to pick him up at the library a few hours later—as instructed—Blumhaven was gone. E-Tech is still considering whether or not to close the cylinder—put Pocono Colony under martial law."

  "Considering?” grunted Nick. “Assholes. They should have closed every terminal the instant they learned that their boss man had disappeared."

  "You're probably right."

  Nick's fingers pecked at the keyboard; a small input screen displayed a long sequence of alphanumeric characters. On a larger monitor, immediately above, cottony puffs emerged from a dreamy blue sky. It was the signature of Freebird, the strange rescue program that continued to hinder Nick and Adam's efforts to thwart the data-destroying sunsetter.

  "If I were going to place bets,” said the midget, pulling back from the terminal with a scowl, “I'd make two wagers. One is that Blumhaven's the victim of foul play—"

  "E-Tech is beginning to suspect as much."

  "—and two is that very soon now, short of a minor miracle, this goddamned sunsetter is going to kick the living shit out of Freebird."

  "There's nothing at all you can do?"

  "Adam and I see only one possibility. Assuming that we're right—that Freebird is indeed the sunsetter's primary target, that this entire twenty-two-year assault upon the archives has been accomplished to drive Freebird out into the open so that it can be destroyed—then we have to figure out a way to protect Freebird. We have to offer the rescue program a haven and somehow convince Freebird to enter that haven. This is not going to be easy, especially since Adam and I now agree that Freebird's pre-Apocalyptic."

  "You're sure?"

  "Yeah, pretty sure. The program's got a real pristine feel to it. Like pop tarts, straight out of their wrappers."

  The Lion refrained from uttering a bewildered pop tarts?—thus sparing himself from Nick's trademark response, Never mind. In recent days, the Lion tried to allow the midget's delicious tidbits of twenty and twenty-first-century history to burst forth without comment.

  "Freebird,” continued Nick, “probably dates from somewhere between 2090 and 2097, the final year when most of the archives were originally transferred from the planet to the Colonies. Which means that its mommy is long gone."

  "You once told me that the archives were thoroughly detoxed before they were transferred up from Earth."

  "Yeah, as thoroughly as we knew how. Obviously, this program got through."

  "So its controller is long dead,” mused the Lion. “We're dealing with a fully automated program."

  "Yep. And that means that a purely emotional appeal will likely be ignored. We can't just say to Freebird: ‘Gosh, come into my computer net and you'll be cozy and safe.’ If its mommy were around, such a tactic might work, provided we could get its mommy to trust us on human terms. But dealing strictly with a logic-driven program?” Nick shrugged. “I figure that we gotta make a real intellectual appeal. Either that, or we make him an offer he can't refuse."

  "An offer he can't refuse?"

  "Never mind."

  The Lion sighed and got up from the console. “What about your IRS 1991 program? The other day, Adam mentioned that the two of you may have a new theory as to why Freebird first made itself known at the exact moment your assault program attacked the sunsetter."

  Excitement flashed across Nick's face. “Yeah, and if we're right, Freebird could prove even more important to us than we first imagined. Adam and I think that the sunsetter, simultaneously faced with two new programs—IRS and Freebird—elected to make an emergency run home to its mommy, for updated instructions. And I'd be willing to bet a shitload of cash that Freebird was counting on exactly that reaction. When the sunsetter headed home to tell Mommy about these strange new programs, Freebird was ready. Freebird followed the sunsetter to its check-in terminal. A simple but brilliant strategy."

  "Then Freebird knows who's running the sunsetter."

  "Yep—or at least it knows the sunsetter's primary check-in location. And since we're already assuming—with a fair degree of certainty—that the sunsetter's Mommy is the same person or persons responsible for the Order of the Birch massacres..."

  "Ash Ock,” concluded the Lion, realizing that this provided added spin to their already palpable suspicions. “And if you're correct, Freebird could lead us straight to the Paratwa—at least to the ones we know must already be in the Colonies."

  "Bingo."

  "So you have to find a way not only to protect Freebird from destruction by the sunsetter but also to pierce its defenses and get to its primary data."

  "Yeah. First we gotta persuade Freebird to enter our bedroom. After that, we work on getting its clothes off."

  "Make her an offer she can't refuse?” suggested the Lion.

  Nick grinned. “Now you're catching on."

  The Lion took a step toward the door. “By the way, Inez Hernandez called. She just learned through some contacts that a pair of FL-Sixteen freelancers spotted Gillian and Buff in Sirak-Brath yesterday, at a sporting arena called Fin Whirl. They met a smuggler named Este Faquod, a known dealer in high-tech weaponry."

  "Interesting,” said Nick, sounding bored. He turned back to one of the keyboards and started typing again.

  The Lion fell silent. These days, when it came to discussions involving Gillian, the Lion sensed that a brooding pain still plagued the midget. No matter how much Nick tried to deny it, shrapnel from the last violent encounter between the former friends had left a deep gash. And the wound showed no signs of healing.

  Two gifted cripples, he thought, using one of Nick's own analogies. Once, Gillian
and Nick had been bound together by a twisted amalgam of needs. And now...

  "Does Inez have any new leads on Venus Cluster ownership?” asked Nick.

  "Nothing. The ICN is still being as stubborn as ever."

  "That's too bad. I thought that by this time maybe—"

  The door slid open. A Costeau guard entered, his thruster rifle held in the ready position. “Sir, there's a commotion outside. Buff Boscondo. She just arrived. She's drawn weapons and refuses to relinquish them. She demands your presence."

  They followed the guard to the front of the house. Outside, in the stark triplicated sunlight of a cloudless Irryan midday, Buff sat casually at the lawn table on the elevated ridge of albino grass. She had a thruster in one hand and the salene in the other. Her weapons were pointed at two Costeaus who stood before her. Another pair of guards crouched below the ridge, behind Buff, their rifles sighted at the back of her head.

  The Lion raised his eyebrows. “There is a problem?"

  Buff plopped her feet lazily across another chair and leaned back. “Nothing but a slight misunderstanding, I hope. I came here for a peaceful visit and boom—my clean brothers"—she waved her thruster arm at the surrounding guards—"demand that I surrender my weapons."

  "A new policy,” the Lion explained. “Our security precautions have become more stringent since the last time you were in the retreat. You should have been stopped at the gate."

  "Yeah, well, there were some old friends of mine doing guard duty. They trust me.” She glared at the two guards.

  "Intentions do not matter,” chided the Lion. “You are violating security—"

  "I can see that. But the problem is, my own personal security precautions have also undergone some changes.” She gazed coldly at the Costeau guards. “I don't give up my weapons. You might say that I ascribe to this policy with something on the order of religious fervor."

  Spare me from fervor, thought the Lion.

  Nick grinned at her. “You've lost weight and you've had a facial. And what an interesting hairdo. I don't believe I've ever seen a tie-dyed scalp before."