Mainline

by Deborah Christian

  The answer came in a rasping whisper. "Because I've been hired to kill you."

  Reva never knew that time could freeze like that. The moment stretched on, and on, each woman unmoving, unable to wrench her gaze from the other, both too shocked by the admission to marshal a response.

  Finally Lish needed to breathe, and drew in a ragged breath. The words came, unthinking. "So are you going to kill me?"

  Reva blinked then, and a single tear flowed free down the plane of her cheek.

  "No."

  Lish forced herself to breathe again.

  The assassin felt an unaccustomed weakness in her knees, and sat gingerly in a nearby chair. She looked to the door, and back to her erstwhile target, framed by ferns and falling water.

  "Do you want me to leave?" she asked, dreading the answer she might receive.

  "If you're not going to kill me, I suppose you ought to stay," Lish replied. She stifled the hysterical chuckle that wanted to follow the words.

  Reva sat like a statue, in emotional shock at her own confession. What have you done? a panicked voice chittered in the back of her mind. And what are you going to do now?

  She struggled to concentrate on the moment, Lish pale and worried-looking across from her, her own hands aching where they gripped the armrests too hard.

  "So tell me about it," her friend prompted her. "Who hired you?"

  It was a straightforward recitation. Concentrating on facts took Reva's mind off the feeling that she had just leapt a terrible precipice, taken a step she could never recall. She told Lish of Adahn Harric, of his ties to Karuu. She didn't know the full extent of his activities on Selmun III, but she knew the crime boss' tentacles reached further into the R'debh underworld than the simple surface levels reflected by Karuu's smuggling.

  His decision to eliminate Lish was a purposeful action, a spiteful quashing of the Holdout who had unwittingly hurt his operations on Selmun III. He was in a hurry to have it done quickly— a demonstration to others, Reva thought, and a warning not to cross Karuu, or the man behind him.

  "How quick is quickly?" Lish asked with morbid interest.

  "Time's up for this job right about now, on his clock."

  "Oh." Her stomach gave a nervous twist. Reva had been with her for most of the week, and she found that profoundly unnerv- j ing. The assassin was beyond or beneath such codes as roi'tas, and had stayed her hand only because of her friendly regard for the Holdout.

  It was a fragile sentiment upon which to hang a life. Lish collected herself with an effort.

  "What should I do now?" she asked.

  The assassin wondered that herself. She felt hollow in the aftermath of her unexpected confession; distraught, it was hard to concentrate, hard to perceive the best course of action. Should she leave R'debh? Should Lish? Lie to Adahn, fake the smuggler's death to buy time? Hire extra security?

  No, Lish's best hope was in dropping from sight completely, thoroughly. Reva's first impulse had been the right one. "Do what I said," she told her. "Leave. Shut down, move elsewhere. I'll help you change your identity."

  "I can't do that."

  "Don't you get it?" Reva tapped her forehead in irritation. "If you stay, you'll be dead. If I don't get you, someone else will."

  Lish chewed her lip. "I'm not leaving until I collect my money. And 10 mil buys a lot of protection."

  "Don't count on it being enough."

  "Maybe you're right. But I can't get started again without it." The Holdout buried her head in her hands. "I'll think about what you say, Reva, but I can't go anywhere until this matter with Edesz is done."

  The assassin understood her point; it was hard to run far when you were broke. She had to have one more week, then, and Reva

  saw what she needed to do. She made her decision abruptly: a snap judgment, like most of her decisions under stress, one based on the infallible instinct that had seen her through so many hits. Or, in this case, the sparing of a life....

  She forced doubts out of her mind. "If you need another week, then I have arrangements to make. I can buy you some extra time."

  "Adahn will extend the contract?"

  "I'll tell him I ran into problems. One more week, I should be able to bargain for that. Sometimes contracts don't get fulfilled, you know? That's life."

  Lish heard the offer without surprise. It was fitting, for one who unthinkingly incurred roi'tas, who had brought Lish under obligation, however denied, and now raised the stakes to the level of a life-debt. Senje'tas. There was a symmetry to it, and the Sa'adani smuggler could only bow beneath the cloak of protection Ashani chose to lay over her.

  "Thanks," she made herself say.

  A meager word. Only her actions now could erase the debt between them.

  "You be sure you're ready to run at the end of that time," Reva added, her tone of voice harsh. "You know what that means. After the swap with Edesz, get out of here."

  Lish hesitated, then shook her head. "I have to get a new warehouse set up. If I fold now, I lose everything I have. Other Holdouts will move in on my buyers; worse, I lose face, and it'll be nearly impossible to rebuild if I return. I can't appear to be on the run, or no one will deal with me. I didn't run from Islanders; I fought back."

  "So what are you saying?"

  Lish spoke earnestly. "That things have to look like business as usual. I have to get back on the waterfront, and not lose any time about it. I have to go on as if I had nothing to fear from-Adahn or anyone else. I'll duck out for a time, like you say, get my bearings. But when I come back—"

  "If."

  "—when I come back, I have to be able to pick up where I left off. So don't ask me to burrow like a drohl. I might as well be dead if I'm going to do that."

  Reva ran scarlet-nailed fingers through her hair and paused, staring at the ceiling. This woman is nearly as stubborn as I am, she thought. Alright. Let her go through the motions. The important thing is that she drop out of sight when her time is up. No use being a walking target waiting for Adahn's pleasure.

  "If that's how you want it, fine," she said. "But I'm making sure you're off someplace safe when this week is up."

  Lish's mouth opened.

  "Just to think things over," Reva insisted.

  The Holdout finally bowed her head in agreement. The assassin knew her business, and it seemed like the wisest course of action. "But only for a while," Lish added. "Until I decide the best way to handle this."

  "Fine." Reva conceded. "Now listen: when I arrange for an extra week, that's all it's going to be. One week. I can't imagine Adahn agreeing to wait any longer than that."

  "He's that eager to see me dead?"

  "He's that vindictive. Our time will be up on the same day you're trading Edesz for the nanotech."

  "Yes?"

  "Are you certain there won't be any delays? I don't want there to be any reason why you have to stick around on this planet after my deadline is come and gone."

  Lish gave a sickly smile at the use of the word. Deadline, in the literal sense.

  "Come on," the assassin urged her. "No delays?"

  The smuggler closed her eyes. "Gods. The outstanding Camisq payment."

  At Reva's prodding she confessed the snag she had run into for the rush-ordered nanotech. "Don't worry," she added in a rush. "FlashMan can help. We'll get that payment made."

  Reva rolled her eyes, certain she would regret what she was about to do. "Yeah, you'll get that payment made," she said. "Right now." She held out her credmeter to the smuggler.

  Lish raised her hands. "No. You've helped me out enough already."

  "Vent that. Too much is riding on this. If you go account-pilfering with FlashMan, there's always the chance that he'll get caught."

  "Doesn't seem any riskier than the other kinds of netrunning he does."

  "Yeah, but there are Bugs in the Net here as long as Security's so interested in this planet. Do you really want to risk your life and your fortune on an unsure thing?"

  Li
sh considered, and stared unhappily at the meter. "No," she admitted.

  "Then take this. Like I said—consider it a loan. You can pay me back in a week."

  If she owed her life already, why not more credits as well? Lish accepted the device. Remarks about blood money and buying friendship flitted through the back of her mind, but that was the residue of fear and stress from this conversation with a hired killer. The truth was far more complex than that, for herself, and surely for Reva as well. She kept her mouth shut and used the card.

  The credit transfer was quickly done. The pair made their peace as best they could, and gradually a semblance of normality returned to their exchanges. When Reva left the room, Lish dispatched the final payment to the Camisq account. Then reality sank in, and she collapsed into a chair in the trembling aftermath of it all.

  LXXVII

  Pigtail of liquid platinum; the red-lacquered button of a single rigger implant, centered in the left temple; left eye glowing green where cyberoptics enhanced the man's vision. Long black hair, buzzed in parallel lines over the ears, pulled back in the white-metal queue that marked his derevin affiliation.

  MazeRats were unknown on Selmun III. Gerick enjoyed the strange pleasure of moving in anonymity, his power and influence unrecognized by locals, who thought him simply a stylish off-worlder from Lyndir or beyond.

  Oh, but he was much more than that.

  He unsealed the front of his Bekavra-cut tunic against the unaccustomed humidity, and took a good last look at the ruins of the Islander's Dive across the street. Then he used a com booth to make an urgent subspace call.

  Adahn came on the line, his face visible; there was no need for anonymity with his trusted street lieutenant. "Yes?"

  "Karuu's street operations are shattered and Islanders out of play for good."

  Adahn's lips thinned. "When did this happen?"

  "Skiffjammers finished the derevin off this morning, local time."

  Harric frowned. "Why are they still taking on Lish's enemies? They have something personal against the Islanders?"

  Gerick cleared his throat. "Word is, Shiran is alive. They were acting on her orders."

  "What?" Adahn's anger was plain. "Alive, as of when?"

  "Heard that word about an hour ago."

  Harric flushed a swarthy red and controlled himself with an effort. "Tell me about Karuu's operations," he said shortly. "Can we save anything?"

  "No."

  "The Bugs?"

  "Off the streets now."

  Harric nodded grimly. "Start putting the pieces back together, Gerick, and make it quick. The credit line's open on this one."

  "I'll take care of it, Boss."

  "You better. What's the word on Karuu?"

  "Everything's in order."

  Adahn heard that with satisfaction.

  "You want me to do anything about this Lish matter?" the MazeRat volunteered.

  A spasm of anger clouded Harric's face, then he gave a chilling smile.

  "No," he told his lieutenant. "You leave that to me."

  The ship that had brought Gerick and five MazeRat companions to Selmun III was the Lady Kestafia. Service bots and maintenance techs prepped the liner for the next leg of her licensed interstellar transport run.

  Away from the preflight bustle, medical crew and a few low-ranking personnel from the steward's staff worked in the cold-storage environmental units. There they finished the last and the slowest of the passenger unloading, the process of thawing out the sleepers: steerage-equivalent passengers who traveled in cryogenic suspension.

  One had flatlined on this trip, a fact not mentioned to the sleepers who rose and left under their own power. The medical officer tendered his regrets to the local family of passenger Dono Algeri; yes, the brother said, please keep him frozen. We'll see our med-clinic about this matter. The doctor smiled knowingly. Some people thought there was a hope for revival, when in fact there was none.

  The grieving family collected their relative and took him in his cryocase to a dockside warehouse. There an impersonal technician thawed the body; poses of sorrow and kinship quickly shed, the former Algeri family manhandled the remains of a cold Dorleoni out of the freezer.

  The corpse was laid on a gravsled and taken to the marina with boxes of supplies. Later that morning, a skiff, moving submerged in the harbor, disgorged the furred body of the deceased through its airlock.

  Washed and tugged by currents, the floater surfaced an hour later by the commercial slips. The Grinds recognized the species of their corpse, and the subsequent identification was made top priority.

  Retina and thumbprints were unmistakable. Obray was informed directly by the medical examiner.

  "We've found Karuu," the man reported. "He's dead."

  LXXVIII

  "Reva." Adahn's voice was smooth and pleasant. "This is a pleasure."

  Expecting to speak with Janus, as she usually did, she was unsettled to get Harric on the line personally.

  He's waiting to hear about the contract, she thought. That's it.

  Never good with small talk, she skipped the pleasantries entirely. "I've run into a problem," she told her client. "I need another week to make the hit."

  Subspace static filled the line. When Harric came back on, his voice was different. Distant. No longer friendly.

  "You've run into a problem, alright. You've created a problem. I'm very disappointed in you, Reva."

  Her lips pressed together. She didn't care whether he was disappointed or not. All that mattered was finessing the man into extending her contract.

  "I'm sorry if you're inconvenienced," she said. "I'm put out, myself. Give me another week, Adahn. Tell you what: next job will cost half the usual."

  There. That should sweeten the deal sufficiently to—

  "Forget it. Your foot-dragging's cost me too much already. I don't care why, and I don't care what difficulties you've had."

  "Listen, Adahn, I—"

  "No, you listen." There was no vidscreen image to view, but his voice turned ugly. "One week, rush. What did that mean to you? To me it meant take Lish out in one day, maybe two, possibly three. Five at the outside, and after that you start to worry. Now we have ten, and no performance?"

  Reva, calling from her room in Lish's villa, squelched the volume on the com link. She didn't want this to carry outside the room.

  "You've cost me, with this no-performance shit."

  "Then you should have specified a half-week, instead of a week."

  "That's crap. How could you get this done in five days if you couldn't do it in ten?"

  She had no answer for that, and Harric's voice became frosty. "By leaving that bitch alive you cost me a Holdout operation and not a few global connections you can't begin to imagine the importance of. No, you're not getting another week."

  She felt her heart drop right into the pit of her stomach, and panicked urgency stressed her voice. "Wait, Adahn. I can make this up to you—"

  "You can't make up shit. Dammit, I want eye-to-eye for this." He stabbed a transmit key, and for the first time she viewed his face. Heavy-browed, florid, cold-eyed. An almost distinguished-looking man, but for the temper that curled his lips and made him seem coarse and cruel.

  "I'm canceling this contract, and I want my money back. Now."

  It took all of Reva's nerve not to reveal dismay on her face. Her husky voice nearly cracked as she told him, "I can't do that."

  Harric's scowl deepened. "You won't return my advance?"

  "I can't. I don't have it all."

  His expression went blank so fast it looked like a curtain had dropped across his features. "Failed performance. And now you keep my money?"

  "I can give you back half."

  "Not good enough. I don't tolerate this. You're never working for me again." "Oh, come on, Adahn." She tried to cajole the man, realizing that Lish's safety depended upon her reaching an understanding with him. "Isn't that a bit extreme? I've never let you down before."

 
"So the first time you do, you cost me more in one week than you would ever have made from me in contracts, if you worked your life long to do it. I can't afford you anymore, even if it is only 100k a hit."

  She took offense at that. "Then maybe I should up my rates," she sniped, forgetting the need to charm the man. It seemed too late for that, anyway.

  She was right. "Up anything you want," he retorted. "You won't be doing it with me or my organization. Don't call me again."

  Her mouth dropped as his image vanished from the screen.

  Yavobo sat before Harric, erect and proud of bearing. "Your time is up," the warrior declared first. "Have you decided how I might demonstrate my merit?"

  "Indeed." Harric nodded, then gestured to Yavobo's foot, now healed. "I understand that injury was done you by this Reva?"

  "Yes. And my hand, and other wounds. Healed, now."

  "But not forgotten."

  "Not forgotten," the alien said coldly.

  "Let me ask you this," Harric said. "Do you seek this assassin only because of your Blood Oath? Or—"

  "Is that not enough?" Yavobo sounded distant and offended.

  "Let me finish, please. Or do you seek her also for personal injury done to you?"

  The alien sat with preternatural stillness before answering. "Both," he finally said. "What is it to you?"

  Harric offered a half-bow from his chair. "Because she has injured me as well. Not in body, but in spirit. So I understand your need for revenge, and will help you in it as far as I may."

  Yavobo was quick to pick up on the nuance. "As far as you may? How far is that?"

  "First is the demonstration of merit you have agreed to perform," Adahn replied. "And here is the task that will show it. There is a smuggler on Selmun III, a woman called Lish. She must be destroyed."

  "I know her."

  Harric heard that, felt unsettled. "You do?"

  "I encountered her when seeking Reva. They know each other."

  "Do they?" The depth of the assassin's deceit came suddenly clear to Adahn, and he was doubly glad of the course of action he had decided on. ' 'Then, my friend, it is this simple. Kill Lish, and I will give you Reva." Janus would know ways to contact the assassin; that was not an empty promise.