Arum Gilger.
Gilger snapped his fingers, and the Luceatans began to slowly, nervously close around him. “I am Sahte!” Fergus shouted. Some stopped in their tracks, but not all.
“Yeor, now, please,” Gilger said. A broad-shouldered Luceatan stepped out of the ranks holding a fat-barreled pistol pointed at the floor.
Fergus mustered some electricity, letting it dance on his fingertips as more Luceatans stopped in their tracks. Yeor smiled, squinted, and fired.
Something hit Fergus’s leg, exploded inside his skin, and he screamed and fell to the floor. A long, thin metal spike was sunk into his lower leg, and through tear-filling eyes he could see the barbed point protruding from the gory mess of what was left of his calf. “Auhhh,” he groaned, trying to push the excruciating pain away somewhere and failing.
Desperate, he tried to summon what last juice he had, intent on blasting Yeor or Gilger or both, and raised his face to see a thin cable running from the spike back to Yeor, who had wrapped the other end around a sharpened metal bar. Another Luceatan lifted a hammer, and they pounded the bar into a hole in the metal floor plate.
“Well, Sahte,” Gilger said. “How does it feel to be grounded?”
“F . . . Fuck,” Fergus said.
Gilger stepped down from the podium and walked toward him with all the swagger Fergus had tried to fake while walking up the corridor. “The rest of you, take a lesson from this: If you’re going to fear a man, look at this pathetic bastard on the floor and ask yourself if you picked the right one.”
Not all the Luceatans looked chastened by this. Gilger stopped in front of Fergus, staying carefully just beyond arm’s reach. Fergus felt a vague glimmer of satisfaction deep in the well of his own agony.
“Well, that’s one demand met,” Gilger said. “Bring in the others.”
Two Luceatans opened the doors, and Harcourt, the Governor, Mari, and Bale stood there, disarmed, another dozen Luceatans behind them. Mari paled when she saw Fergus on the floor in a pool of blood. “Fergus?” she asked, voice carrying in the hall.
“Fergus,” Gilger said. “What a ridiculous name for a ridiculous man.” He faced his Luceatans again. “This man didn’t kill Graf. The Asiig did. They made this man their creature, but I brought him down. Graf’s soul is with us in this victory, in this place right now!”
“Not just his soul,” the Governor said, his voice calm. His hand slipped out of his robe and held out a small collection of cubes. “I have his ear.”
Gilger’s expression transformed in an instant from triumph to white-hot anger. He walked forward and slapped the Governor’s hand, sending the collection of cubes to the floor. They broke apart and scattered into the recesses and shadows of the room. “How dare you?” He spat. “He was my brother.”
“Ah, I get it now!” Harcourt said. “That mysterious connection none of us could figure out. So which one of you was the bastard? Him, obviously. Oh, and lemme guess: half Marsie too?”
Gilger’s face twisted, and he punched Harcourt hard in the stomach, then brought his fist down on Harcourt’s head when the man doubled over, knocking him to the floor. “It is not your business,” he said. “I would not be so smug if I were you! We were going to rule together, him at my side, as we should have back on Baselle. And I will rule here, or I will leave this place and all the tiny, meaningless, inadequate people in it a burnt and desolate tribute to his memory.”
He turned on Bale and Mari. “And speaking of the inadequate, who the fuck are you two? A flunky and a Vahn?”
Mari had knelt beside Harcourt, but she stared up at Gilger with more hatred and fury than Fergus had ever seen in one person. “I came to look a murderer in the eyes,” she said.
Bale coughed. “I came along because I figured these idiots would need help getting home again after they’d finished with you,” he said.
Such bravado, Fergus thought. I love these people, but I wish they’d shut up.
Gilger apparently felt the same way. “Really?” he said. “Finished with me? I suppose your alien puppet bleeding to death on the floor will leap to his feet with one last deadly trick? I don’t think so. What do any of you have except brave words? Do you know what I have? I have your entire little shit settlement here in the palm of my hand, and that palm can just as easily be a fist.”
“None of the people you killed ever did anything to you,” Mari said.
“They didn’t do anything for me, either,” Gilger said. “And that dumb asshole Vinsic stabbed me in the back and blew up my damned home. I hate all of you, every single one of you, and I am no longer interested in sympathy or subtlety to get what I want. Which sunshield should I destroy next? The one right next to your precious Wheels? Or Seven, all the way across Cernee near Medusa, which would take out your medics and your oxygen production in one blow? Pick one.”
“I’d rather not,” Mari said.
“Then should I pick?” Gilger said. “Would you like that better? Yeor, call the team in Sunshield One. Have them prep and back out, then wait for my signal. If the fucking Shielders won’t come out and surrender, they can die wherever they’re hiding.”
Everyone was looking at Gilger and his prisoners, ignoring the fallen man on the floor.
Fergus straightened his arms, pushing himself up against the floor, trying to get his one good leg back under him while ignoring the sticky puddle beneath the other. As soon as he was steady, he reached behind his shoulder and grabbed the tube that was there, letting himself fall the rest of the way over into a sitting position.
“I’d rather you didn’t, either,” he said, and although his voice wasn’t as loud as he’d hoped, he was pleased that it didn’t shake. Gilger turned and saw him, saw the tube, and snapped his fingers again. Instantly three dozen pistols were pointing his way.
“What’s in the tube?” Gilger asked, taking a step toward him. “A weapon? A copy of your will? Do you think you can get it out before every man in this room fries you into a blackened smear on the floor? Or is this just a ploy for a faster death?”
“Or a slower one,” Fergus said. He held up the tube. “Want to see which?”
“Don’t you even think—” Gilger said, but before he could even finish his sentence, Fergus had slapped the bottom of the tube, and the tiny rigged mechanism embedded there blew the entire contents out in a cloud of black dust that settled over Gilger and his people behind him.
“You’re going to kill me with dust?” Gilger asked, brushing at his clothes. He started to laugh, but then his hand paused, frozen, as he stared at it.
The Luceatan beside Gilger shrieked, slapping at his clothes. “Something bit me!” he shouted.
Gilger began furiously shaking his tunic, jumping away from the others quickly. “What the fuck?” he said. “You didn’t— Ouch!” He began scrabbling at his neck, trying desperately to dislodge whatever was there.
Fergus dropped the tube, fell back onto his elbows. “Spore ticks,” he said. “Now we all die. Everyone in this room. If you run away, you take death everywhere you go: to your people here in Cernee or back to Luceatos, to your families, your children. Now which pathetic bastard do you fear?”
The Luceatans around them began to shrink back as one, and as they did, one cried out and grabbed his shoulder. “It bit me!” he shouted, and without hesitation he raised his pistol, put it against the side of his head, and blew his own brains out.
The ranks broke, panicking, running from the tumbling corpse of the dead man toward the doors.
Something bit Fergus, and he winced and looked down to see the black shape scuttling away, leaving a red welt already growing in its wake. “Pissed you right off, didn’t I?” he said.
“You!” Gilger roared. “You’ll die too!”
“Yeah, but I was going to anyway, right?” Fergus said. He pointed at the harpoon impaling his leg. “Faster than you.�
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“And your friends? You’ve condemned them!”
“Assassins don’t have friends,” Fergus scoffed. “There are people we can use, and people who get in our way, and no one else.”
Mari shrieked and began to tear at her suit. Her shoulder where it met her neck was a bloodied red-and-purple mess. “Aaahh!” she cried. “Help me! Someone help me!”
Bale and Harcourt were both pulling at their own clothing, showing similar patches of spore tick blight. “Kill me,” Harcourt begged Gilger, falling to his knees. “It’s what you wanted, so do it! Don’t make me die this way.”
Gilger’s eyes were wide, and he was breathing hard. “No,” he said. “You can die this way, but not me. All of you can die and rot, but I will not die here with you!”
He turned, stumbling up the auditorium steps toward the rear door, slapping at his leg and stumbling as he was bitten again. “Yeor! Where the fuck are you? We need to get to an escape pod!”
Yeor stepped out of the shadows by the door. He was pale and sweating, several red welts on his face and neck. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but there’s no going back to Luceatos. I won’t let you kill my friends, my ken.” He raised his pistol, and as the astonished Gilger opened his mouth to shout, Yeor shot him.
Gilger fell, tumbling down the stairs to land face-up and unmoving not far from Fergus.
Yeor raised his weapon again. “For mercy,” he said, pointing it at Fergus.
“Uh, you know, I’m actually okay with the long, lingering death,” Fergus said. “With my leg and all. I appreciate the kindness, but honest, I’m good here.”
“Me too,” Harcourt said, raising his face up from the floor where he’d been writhing in a mindless stupor moments before.
“What in Hell?” the Luceatan said. “Some trick? I—”
He was hit from behind by the door crashing open and several of the Luceatans who had fled tumbling back into the room, screaming. Yeor turned and was shot by someone beyond the door. He dropped his pistol and crumpled.
A half dozen people in white suits pushed through the door, firing with startling efficiency. A few minutes later, Fergus and his friends were the only remaining living people in the room besides the Shielders. “Which one of you assholes,” the lead Shielder said, her suit carefully closed and sealed, “brought the fucking spore tick plague into our home?”
“It’s a fake,” Fergus said.
She walked up to where Fergus was lying on the floor bleeding and held out her palm. In the center of the white glove sat a perfectly still, tiny black shape. “This is a spore tick,” she said. “It is most certainly real.”
“Yeah, but it’s dead,” Fergus said. “They’re all dead. Years dead.”
“These men have fresh stings!”
“Ballroaches. I mixed them in with the dead spore ticks. They’re almost the same size, move too fast to get a close look at, and bite the shit out of everything and everyone when they’re agitated.”
“Your friends all exhibit the sores of infestation,” she said.
Harcourt lifted a finger, wet it on his tongue, and ran it across the sore on his exposed abdomen. The sore smeared and came off on his finger. “Paint,” he said.
Now the Shielder opened her face shield and stared at them all one by one. Her eyes, in a field of blue-and-gold paint, were wide in astonishment. “This was a hoax?” she said. “None of you are dying?”
“I am,” Fergus said, pointing at his leg. He was feeling light-headed, afraid he was about to pass out, and thought it worth pointing out. “Shot with a harpoon gun, as it turns out. Just stand there and let me die here, okay, and yeah, you’re welcome for saving the rest of your sunshields, by the way. Don’t forget to put that in your Narrative.”
The Shielder rolled her eyes. “This is why we don’t like talking to you people,” she said. “You’re all fucking crazy. And if I find out you’re back because someone drew you here, I’m going to shove them out an airlock.” She signaled, and the rest of her people moved into the room and began checking the bodies to make sure all of them were dead. “Other than this man, does anyone else need medical assistance?” she asked.
“Find us some sort of anti-itch cream,” Mari said, scratching furiously, “and I’ll be indebted to you for the rest of my life.”
Chapter 28
“You can stay here,” Harcourt said. “As long as you want.”
Fergus leaned forward, tapping the end of his cane on the floor, trying to get a feel for it. His leg ached—sometimes the pain came in burning waves that left him speechless—but Ili had assured him it was healing nicely and he’d heal faster if he stopped complaining about it. It wasn’t, all in all, the worst advice he’d ever been given.
The Wheels and Blackcans had been temporarily reconnected while they waited for a permanent cable. Disconnected habs that were still habitable but lacked any self-generation capability were being prioritized. Power was being rationed carefully, but with fewer habs—some had been obliterated, some damaged enough to render them unsafe—it was sufficient for the short term. A new sunshield would take years to finish, but the Shielders had assured everyone they would take care of it and would everyone please go away. The beginnings of normality were starting to peek out through the chaos.
“I have some things I need to do,” Fergus said.
“They’re still waiting for you,” Mari said. “I think you’re their last unfinished business here, at least for now.”
The Asiig had given back a handful of the people they’d picked up crossing the Halo during the war, mostly frightened families who did not—or would not—speak about what had happened to them. Whatever changes might have been made were not obvious, not yet. Right now they were in Ili’s care, and Mauda was quietly consulting.
“Yeah,” Fergus said. “I think it’s time.”
He slowly stood, leaning heavily on the cane, and tested his leg on the ground. He could step as long as he didn’t put too much weight on it. He was looking forward to being back out in space with no gravity to pull down on him. “I’ve spent most of my life finding things,” he said. “Never thought to go look for myself. And now I’m someone else entirely. I need some time to get my head around that.”
“If you can’t get into the ship, come back here, and we’ll figure something out,” Harcourt said. “I’m sure we can find some task to occupy your prodigious need to get into trouble.”
“Bogstone erupted,” Arelyn added from where she stood behind Harcourt’s chair. She and Mari seemed to be talking again; the friendship wasn’t yet back to where it had been and still might never be, but at least it was improving. “They’ll be looking for cleanup crew. Might be just your thing, being neck-deep in shit you’re possibly responsible for.”
Fergus laughed, not taking her bait. “I’ll pass, thanks. Besides, the Shipmakers are waiting on me too, and they’re probably very worried by now.”
“If they know you, they’re probably worried all the time anyway,” Mari said.
“A new suit is waiting for you at the platform,” Harcourt added. “Top anti-EMP military tech there is. And there’s a ’stick waiting for you, fully charged. I bought it for you special. It took me some effort to find just the right one.”
“Thanks,” Fergus said. “And I mean it.”
Harcourt smiled. “It’s the least I could do.”
Fergus walked carefully toward the door. Bale stood there waiting. “I’ll give you a hand,” he said. “Suits are no fun to put on when you’re hurt.”
“Thanks,” Fergus said again. He waved to the gathered people in the room and followed Bale toward the dock. “Going to be a while, if ever, before Arelyn forgives me for existing. Speaking of grudges, how’s your brother doing?”
Bale shrugged. “Pissed that I survived only to throw myself right back into danger.”
“And how’s
Ms. Ili handling Vinsic being gone?”
“Same as Ms. Ili takes everything, I expect. In other words, who knows? She’s not thrilled that the Governor and Mr. Harcourt are working so closely together—something about power vacuums and trust issues—but she’ll get over it when things settle down without trouble.”
Stuck in Medusa for the first week after the confrontation in the central sunshield under the very intentional care of a less-than-fond-of-him Medic Zofia, Fergus’s access to news had been sparse. What was obvious, then and now, was that nearly everyone in Cernee who could had pitched in to save those parts of Cernee that needed it and that lines of political power seemed irrelevant, or at least less relevant than saving lives. It made Fergus proud of this place, even if it was not his own.
“Can I ask . . .” Bale said. “Did you really think that trick with the ballroaches was going to work?”
“Not a shot in hell,” Fergus said, “but it was the only thing I could think of. I was hoping I’d get lucky.”
“Okay,” Bale said, digesting that. “I hope you stay lucky,” he said at last, “and that we see you again.”
Fergus nodded. At the platform, Bale held up a suit. It was plain black, but on the back, between the shoulder blades, were the concentric green, blue, and red circles and spokes of the Wheels city-mark. It was, he knew, both an apology and an offer. Fergus smiled as Bale helped him struggle into the suit. Once on and sealed, it fit perfectly.
Bale handed him a small pack. “Three bottles of water,” he said, “since you get thirsty. And Mauda kindly sent you a care package of lichen cakes. In the event you ever find yourself tempted to eat them, Mr. Harcourt generously also included a bottle of the cheapest Crossroads grain-alk we could find. That’ll kill your taste buds for a week. Oh, and he says to remind you that you still owe him for the business suit.”
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