"Sandoval. First."
"Christian does little that his masters do not approve, Carl. I am not sure he will come."
"Tell him that we will come to Japan, if he aids us."
"We?"
"The telepaths, Jacqueline. You need not commit yourself, or the de Nostri."
She studied his image for a long time. "Very well, Carl. We shall be the Three Musketeers again, no? Such a strange thing. I had thought that wheel had turned." Her manner became businesslike. "Where shall we meet you?"
"The bar Cojones, in Brasilia. It's a dark place; dress appropriately, you'll pass."
"When?"
"Tomorrow morning. They open at nine."
"I shall be there. And Christian, I hope."
"Godspeed, Jacqueline."
"And you, Carl."
It was not until Sunday that the Electronic Times ran newsdancer Gerold McKann's last work before his untimely death.
It was his interview with Carl Castanaveras.
In the hours around midnight, while Sunday became markdate Monday, Carl sat in a clearing midway up a mountain in the midst of jungle, just outside the sweep of patrols that protected the Sandoval estate. He sat beneath the shelter of the trees, sweat dripping down his motionless body, waiting for Chris and Jacqueline to return to him.
Here, as everywhere else in the world, the blunders of the Weather Bureau were felt; late at night, in the midst of the Brazilian winter, high enough that snow sometimes fell, the sweltering heat was nearly intolerable.
Carl sat in the heat, and waited. He wore black fatigues with minimal hardware to slow him down; if it came to a serious firefight they were likely dead regardless. His weapons were a knife with an edge that was only three molecules wide, a garotte, a small .45-caliber automatic in case of rain, and an Excalibur Series Two dual frequency short laser rifle. The weapon was simple, unlike some variable lasers Carl had seen--difficult to make a mistake with, even under confused combat conditions. The frequency toggle had only two positions. For close-up antipersonnel work the rifle dropped down into maser frequencies and sprayed a continuous beam of semicoherent microwaves; you could fry a small roomful of people nearly as quickly as with a true flamethrower, and it was much more portable. Against delicate electronics or flesh, or any object with water in its makeup, it was as lethal as an autoshot, and it lasted longer in an all-out firefight. Against waldos it was less efficient, while set to maser frequencies. At its higher frequency it was a true coherent laser, emitting a continuous invisible beam of X-rays. Almost nothing would halt the X-laser; the beam sliced with equal efficiency through stone and metal, flesh and bone.
There was more modern hardware on the market; the Series Two was nearly a decade old. But there was not yet in Carl's opinion a superior all-purpose weapon.
It felt strange, a sensation that reached him even through the dead numbness following the rage, that he should be sitting in yet another jungle, waiting for Jacqueline and Chris to return from another foray. For six years he and Chris and Jacqueline had worked together; usually but not always with Peaceforcers other than Chris to coordinate the job. Even when Chris had given them every reason to trust him, the French PKF Elite had not.
There was no sound audible to Carl, whose hearing was no better than a normal human's; cross-legged, eyes closed, Carl knew through other senses that Jacqueline de Nostri, naked but for her fur and a belt where her weapons were slung, had moved out of a nearby tree and into the one beneath which he sat. Moments later Chris Summers brushed almost as quietly through the undergrowth and lowered himself to the ground next to Carl.
They breathed quietly. It was the only sound they made. They did not speak aloud. The most sensitive radio detectors known to man could not have heard their discussions. Carl simply listened in on them constantly. What Jacqueline thought, Chris Summers heard; what Chris thought, Carl made certain Jacqueline heard.
Jacqueline de Nostri reclined languidly in the low limbs of the tree. We will wait until near morning. That was when the guards grew most careless last night. And then we shall have to move with great speed; we will not want to work when there is light. They do not use light enhancing goggles or glasses; therefore each of us must see better than they can. Especially Christian. It is one of our few advantages. Our weapons are not as powerful as theirs, except for the autoshot Christian carries.
Summers lay motionless on his back, looking up into the tree, toward Jacqueline. I'm getting clumsy in my old age. I almost had to kill one of Sandoval's patrol. He damn near walked into me while I was looking out over the spread.
He didn't suspect anything? asked Carl.
No, or I'd have killed him. One good thing out of it: I got a good close look at the man before he passed me by. I don't think they're wired for diagnostics or IDs. Good news is we can probably pick them off without upsetting anybody until it's time for them to report in, and they won't have any way except visual ID to be sure that you're not two of their own. Bad news is the two of you can't snatch their nonexistent IDs and make your way through the automated defenses that way. Chris Summers shifted position slightly, clasping his hands beneath his head as he stared up at the branches and stars. I did get the StingRays into place. Three of them, covering the house from its north side across an arc of one hundred twenty degrees. Also, I located the deep radar. Unless--or until--we decide to take them out as well, they mean I can't get closer than about a quarter of a kilometer away from the house. That appears to be the range the radar sweeps. All the metal and heavy ceramic in my body, I'd light up the deep radar like a tank.
Jacqueline made a purring noise of satisfaction. The time I spent waiting for you to come, Carl, I have planted darts on eight different members of the patrol. Cerabonic construction, and small. I do not think any of the troops noticed they had been shot. If things get out of hand we can detonate them at any time. Each dart contains an extremely small amount of antimatter in a constraining torus. Most of them will not be on patrol when we go in, but asleep in their barracks. We may take out most of the backup guards in this fashion.
Well done, said Carl. Where does their power come from?
There was silence from the other two. Okay, said Carl, underground cabling, or does he have his own fusion plant? Or both?
Summers said, He's a paranoid bastard, judging from the radar and light trips and troops. My guess would be internal fusion; my bet would be both.
Guesses are for when you can afford to be wrong.
I believe I taught you that, Carl.
Yes, said Carl, eyes seeking out across the dark mountain to where Tio Sandoval waited for him in a brightly lit mansion. I believe so.
A note from the editors of the Electronic Times:
The following interview, which strongly condemns the policies of the Secretary General and of the United Nations Peace Keeping Force, was recorded on Wednesday, June 21. The next day two things happened. Althea Castanaveras, one of the Castanaveras telepaths, on assignment for Sandoval Biochemicals in Brazil, was killed by snakebite while working in an area that is not known for poisonous reptiles; and Gerold McKann was brutally murdered in his uptown New York City apartment, and his copies of this interview were destroyed. Standard operating procedure requires that Times reporters file copies of their current jobs with the central Times database. Gerold McKann did so; that copy, wholly unedited, is what you will now audit.
At dateline, no suspect has been charged with Gerold McKann's murder. New York City Police Commissioner Maxwell Devlin reports that the police currently have no suspects--at least, none they are willing to name.
The file opens with the image of Gerold McKann, smiling into the holocams. He is dressed in a severe business suit of conservative cut, without either a tie or shoulder silks. He is not wearing makeup, or if he is, has turned it off. Edit notes attached at this point reference background information on the telepaths, the de Nostri, the administration of Darryl Amnier, and a brief overview of Amnier's and Malko Kalharri's rol
es in the Unification War. Biographical profiles of the major players in the current political dispute are included.
McKann: Edit, this is the intro for the Sunday interview. (McKann pauses and says something that is not audible on the recording, to a person standing off-holocam. He smiles and, holding the smile, turns back to the holocam.) Good morning. My name is Gerold McKann, and I'm here this morning with an Electronic Times exclusive interview with Carl Castanaveras. Most of you know of him; he's the young, somewhat reclusive leader of the genegineered telepaths who recently obtained their independence from the United Nations Peace Keeping Force. Edit, cut and insert at transition.
(The holocams turn slowly, pulling back from the tight focus on Gerold McKann to include Carl Castanaveras. He is seated at the left end of a small sofa, dressed in dark boots, black slacks and a long-sleeved red silk shirt. He is wearing mirrored sunglasses; a male voice from off-holocam advises him to remove them, and he does so, placing them in the pocket of his shirt. An edit note attached at this point identifies the voice as that of Malko Kalharri. Behind Castanaveras, through a wide bay window, stretch the front lawns of the Complex. In the distance, demonstrators are visible, milling in the streets.)
McKann: How do you feel, Carl?
Castanaveras: Fine, thank you.
McKann: Relax, okay? We're going to run over most of this a couple of times from different directions, and I'll edit from that. Have you ever been interviewed before?
Castanaveras: Briefly. Not like this.
McKann: If you hear me begin a sentence with "edit" it's a search word tagging a note I'm making for editing purposes later. As for the holocams, just forget them being there. Talk to me, not them.
Castanaveras: Sure.
McKann: Good morning, Carl. How are you today?
Castanaveras: Fine, thank you. Except that it's almost three in the afternoon.
McKann: Yeah, but the interview's going to run in the Sunday morning edition. Attention to detail. (Pause.) The general outline of your story is well known to our users. Nonetheless, there are details that have never really been brought to light. I know there are some subjects you can't discuss because they've been classified, so if we start getting into one of those areas, let me know and I'll back out.
Castanaveras: The areas that we can't discuss are largely those that relate to the details of the jobs I did for the Peaceforcers. Certainly it's no secret that I--and other telepaths--have done intelligence work for them.
McKann: Carl, I guess the best place for us to start is in the beginning. Why were you created in the first place?
Castanaveras: Personally? Or the telepaths as a group?
McKann: Say both.
Castanaveras: As a group, we were created to gather information for the Peaceforcers. Most people know that, I think. But that was only after both Jany and I had shown we possessed the telepathic gift. Those of us born before then were simply part of what was--improperly--called Project Superman. Back in the late twenties, the United Nations sponsored several different lines of research into genetic engineering. Most of what they were looking for involved improved strength and endurance--better soldiers, essentially. Remember that this was just after the end of the War, when it looked likely that the Peaceforcers would have to put down rebellion after rebellion until the end of time. I was a result of one of those lines of research. History seems to have given de Nostri a lot of credit that he doesn't deserve, as far as the creation of the science of genegineering goes. De Nostri did raise the practice of gene splicing to an art; he was probably the best gene splicer the world has ever seen. But that is not the same thing as designing structures at the DNA level, which was Suzanne Montignet's accomplishment.
McKann: It seems they didn't exactly get what they were looking for.
Castanaveras: You mean soldiers? Perhaps they did, in the de Nostri. The de Nostri are wonderfully suited for the task of soldiering, at least at the physical level. And they do enjoy battle, that's hardly a secret. The U.N. did not, fortunately, achieve their goals in the telepaths. We are a peaceful people.
Two hours before dawn they moved.
The spot where they had waited through the night was separated by a small gorge from the Sandoval estate. The patrols swept to the edge of the gorge and went no farther. Foolishly, the patrol was patterned in a fashion that repeated itself at least twice a day; by the time early Monday morning had arrived Jacqueline had watched the patrol's search pattern roll over three times.
They came down off the mountain in the hot stillness of early morning, moving slowly into their positions on the other side of the gorge. Deep infrared light trips were set at multiple waist-high locations throughout the approach to the house. The beams were within Chris's visual range; they were not within either Carl's or Jacqueline's, and as a result they both wore enhancing sunglasses that extended their eyesight into ranges nearly as wide as Chris's. Pressure pads were doubtless buried at various points as well. The patrols they had to penetrate were private Sandoval guards, but there was a barracks of Army troops tucked not quite a half a kilometer down the main access road leading away from the estate.
At 4:10 a.m., a guard made his crashing noisy way through the underbrush lining the dry gulch that marked the perimeter of their patrol. Summers tracked him with a sonic rifle for nearly five seconds before the man stumbled and went to his knees. Summers held the beam of sound on the man for another five seconds before releasing the trigger.
At 4:15 a.m. a second guard came along and received the same treatment, fifteen meters earlier. There would not be another security guard through for another forty minutes. Carl carried the first guard over to rest next to the second and laid him down. With Chris and Jacqueline covering him, he closed his eyes, left the world behind, and one after another went inside their unconscious minds.
...rolling waves of black fear, and the constant sickness in his stomach. He was so afraid, always so afraid, and the others knew they all knew...Carl moved through the shattered remnants of the fear that had come to the man when he realized that something was dreadfully wrong, and he was already too weak to do anything about it, and then unconsciousness claimed him...deeper, down into memory, and as always the strong memories were of fear and guilt and rage and hatred, and they leapt up to greet him, to envelop him...Rita Sandoval's naked body, and he had been unable to tear his eyes away from her and the door had closed and Tio Sandoval had passed by only moments later, and Sandoval knew he had been spying on the Senorita, it was there in his evil smile...faces, a swirl of faces, only one of which was right, a short, fat man with a face that never held joy, never held anything but a mild contempt for the rest of the world, sitting at a row of monitors....
Out and in again, and the man was almost a moron, with faded grey memories of peoples and places, knowing only that he served the Sandovals and they fed him and cared for him, and with a dim gratitude for the kindnesses his commanding officer sometimes showed him, and a totally unconscious revulsion for the night-watch monitoring officer, the man with the round face, who said things to him he could not understand....
Carl opened his eyes. He was only vaguely aware of how drenched with sweat he had become. He ignored the faint trace of an oncoming headache and held the image of the short fat man in his consciousness and focused upon it, seeking into the great house, finding nothing and then a flicker, and he heard himself murmuring aloud, "Sleep, sleep..." The flicker steadied and for a brief moment Carl's mind enveloped that of Rico Benitez, and through his eyes scanned monitors that held images of jungle and broad swaths of lawn and corridors and bedrooms, and then there was only silence, throughout the great house, the silence of the small death that was sleep.
"Done," he whispered.
Jacqueline de Nostri did not even use her knife. She knelt and opened their throats to the night air with her claws.
Neither Carl nor Chris Summers attempted to stop her. The watch officer is asleep, said Carl. I don't know if anybody else was in there
with him.
Chris Summers nodded. You and Jacki probably won't set off wake-up alarms unless they have logic inside programmed for face and shape recognition. I don't go past this point; I'd set off their deep radar. I'm going to work my way around the perimeter over to the main road. Summers faded into the darkness. I'll take 'em out as I come to 'em. You're on your own, kids. If it blows call me and I'll come in. Otherwise I'll see you at pickup.
Carl unslung his maser rifle and gestured with it toward the estate. Let's go deal some death.
Yes.
They moved in.
McKann: What's it like to read another human's mind?
Castanaveras: Unpleasant.
McKann: Can't you be a little more specific than that?
Castanaveras: I'm not sure I can, not in any meaningful way. In the purest sense, it's not reading minds. A better description would be to say that I look at the world through another person's eyes. While I do it I am both persons, both myself and whoever it is I am in touch with. I see through two pairs of eyes, think with two minds. If I read the mind of someone who is more intelligent than I am--and I have, on occasion--in that moment, I am capable of understanding perfectly things that generally are not within my grasp. Two minds, linked by one Gift.
McKann: You still haven't explained your use of the word "unpleasant."
Castanaveras: Do you know what the commonest emotion is?
McKann: I can guess.
Castanaveras: No you can't. Guilt. This vast regret for the things that they've done that are wrong. Those are the people whose minds it hurts to contact, and they are far and away in the majority. The percentage of people who don't suffer from guilt is so vanishingly small I'm tempted to say that such people are not sane. Either they're not sane or the rest of us are not sane, and those of us who feel shame for things we've done far outnumber those who don't.
McKann: Isn't that one of the definitions of a sociopathic personality? The inability to feel guilt?
(Castanaveras is silent a long moment.)
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