Eternity's End

by Jeffrey Carver

  Another risk of exposure. And who's gonna take the heat? Not Command. Not North. Talbott scowled up and down the console. God, he wanted a drink right now.

  "What do you think about picking them off in the city?" Paroti asked.

  Talbott glared up at him. Why is this idiot in charge? He drew a breath. "We can't take chances like that, Colonel. Going after them out in the wilderness was risky enough. This is supposed to be an undercover operation, remember?" And now we screwed it up royally.

  "Don't be a wise ass. Give me some options. What about that other rigger, or whatever the hell she is. Legroeder's woman. Can we do something with her? She probably knows some things that would be useful."

  Talbott rocked back in his chair, surprised by his commander. "There's a thought now. That rigger might not be so eager to spill his guts if we've got his girl. We'd probably have to have Command pass on it first. And I suppose we'll need to see what Hizhonor North has to say. But grabbing her just might be a way to pull our nuts out of the fire on this one."

  "Then get on it..."

  * * *

  "You know," Legroeder said, between glances at the instruments and the autopilot, "we're flying what could easily be construed as a stolen craft. Plus, we've got a box full of documents that were probably known to have been in his archives. We might want to do some thinking about how that's going to look."

  "I have been thinking," she said softly. "And I don't like what I'm hearing."

  "You think they're going to come after us?"

  "I think the police will probably want to have some words with us."

  "Which raises the next question. Are they in on this frame-up business?"

  Harriet bit her lip. "Maybe not. Whatever's going on at the RiggerGuild—and whoever they're colluding with—I haven't seen a reason yet to suspect the police."

  "But do we trust them enough to go back to Elmira? Will we be safe there?" They were flying on a southerly heading at the moment; Elmira was to the southeast.

  Harriet scowled in concentration. Clearly matters had gone beyond anything in her experience. "Seems to me, if anything, we're probably safer in the city. At least there we have some control, and we can use the legal system. Peter has good security, and whoever these people are, they don't seem eager to reveal themselves."

  "They might not have to, if they can frame us for McGinnis's house burning."

  "Yes, but we were shot at before we landed there."

  "Which will be hard to prove, until someone gets through the forcefield and looks at the rental flyer."

  "Well, nothing's easy," Harriet said. "You know, McGinnis knew more than he told us. I think he was expecting us."

  "Why do you say that?"

  "For one thing, he knew who we were. Remember his remark about whoever shot at us not liking lawyers? Only I didn't tell him I was a lawyer?"

  Legroeder grunted. "I was wondering about his reconstructive surgery. I didn't see any datachip markers on him, but that doesn't mean he didn't have implants."

  "Meaning—? What are you thinking?"

  "I don't know." Legroeder rubbed his jaw. His guess was, anyone with implants was suspect on this world; but that didn't mean he was guilty of anything. "I'm just thinking Jakus had them, and gave every sign of being under their influence. And we know where he got his implants."

  Harriet was watching him over her glasses. "Golen Space?"

  Legroeder nodded. Implants made him uneasy enough in and of themselves; but in the pirate culture, they were designed without safeguards, and were used for control as much as for enhancement. He shuddered, remembering how close he had come to having them in his own head.

  With a deep breath, he set a new course for Elmira.

  * * *

  They landed at the edge of the city shortly after sunset, in a driving rainstorm. They sat in the grounded flyer, listening to the rain pound on the roof, while Harriet called for Peter to send a car to meet them, and made arrangements for the flyer to be garaged outside the city. Then they piled into Peter's associate's car with the box of documents. It was a gloomy ride to Harriet's office, in the rain and the darkness. They were greeted outside by another of the PI's men, already on watch.

  When they walked into the office, shaking off the raindrops, Legroeder was surprised to see a woman sitting at Harriet's desk, poring over Harriet's com-console. The woman's face looked familiar. "Hi, Mom," she said. "I was starting to worry."

  "We had a few problems, dear," Harriet answered, showing Legroeder where to put the box. "Like someone trying to shoot us out of the sky, and then a house burning down. Legroeder, this is my daughter Morgan. Morgan, Rigger Legroeder."

  They shook hands. Morgan appeared to be in her mid thirties, a good-looking woman with a narrower and more angular face than Harriet's, but with her mother's greenish eyes and intensity of expression. She looked alarmed as her mother bustled around the office, turning down lights and closing shades. Then Harriet told her about the visit with McGinnis.

  "Christ, Mother! You need to get some security. Do you think they'll attack you here in the city?"

  Harriet sank into an overstuffed chair with a heartfelt sigh. "I don't think so. But Peter's on his way over now. We'll do whatever he says."

  "But what about Mr. McGinnis? Do you have any idea what's happened to him?"

  Harriet looked grim. "I have a pretty good idea, yes, though I hope I'm wrong. I'll ask Peter to send someone up there as soon as possible. But in the meantime, McGinnis gave us some extremely sensitive materials to safeguard. This stuff could be major armament for Legroeder in his case with the Guild and the Spacing Authority. What else it will do, I don't know." Harriet got up with a groan and pried the lid off the box. "Somebody is awfully afraid of what's in there. So let's get busy making backup copies. We'll want one in a bank vault, one in free-float storage on the net, and maybe a couple in other places. Let's copy the cube first, then scan in all the hardcopy."

  "Let me clear a space here," Morgan said. A smile flickered on her lips. "Jeez, mother, I haven't seen you look this alive in years. Maybe you should have people shoot at you more often." The smile disappeared when it became apparent that neither Harriet nor Legroeder could make light of the situation. "Sorry. Let me see if I can get this going for you."

  "Any calls while we were gone?"

  "Yes—I almost forgot. There was a call for Legroeder from the hospital. It was sealed, so I saved it for you." Morgan tapped on the phone pad and turned the viewer toward Legroeder. "Do you want to take it in private?"

  Legroeder shook his head. Did Maris wake up? he wondered hopefully. He keyed the call and saw the face of the attending physician.

  "Mr. Legroeder," said the doctor, "I'm calling to let you know that Maris O'Hare is about to be transferred out of our facility. Some of her relatives came by and made the arrangements. I know you were concerned about her, and I hope this reaches you before she's gone. Please give me a call back. It's now nineteen hundred hours."

  Oh, sweet Jesus. Legroeder looked up at Harriet in fear. "Somebody got to Maris." He checked the time. It was 2430, getting late in the evening.

  Harriet hurried to his side. "What happened?"

  He shook his head and pressed the callback button.

  The phone blinked on, displaying the face of the duty nurse. Legroeder asked for Doctor Goldman and was promptly put on hold. He fumed helplessly until the doctor came on. "Mr. Legroeder—I was just on my way out. I'm not sure if Ms. O'Hare is still here. They were supposed to come for her a little while ago."

  "Who was?"

  "Their names were—ahh, MacAffee and Squire. Man and woman. As I said in the message, they were family. Half-siblings, I believe."

  "Doctor, she doesn't have any family on Faber Eridani! She told me her closest family was on Gamma Ori Three. That's about as far away as you can get and still be in the same galaxy! There's no way they could be here now even if they'd been sent word!"

  The doctor leaned away from the phon
e, frowning. "Well, that's very strange. They had all the proper credentials. Are you sure? From what you told me, her knowledge of her family was years out of date."

  Legroeder shook his head vigorously. "No—this isn't right!" His heart was sinking.

  "Well, it was all according to procedure—though I did argue against moving her. I said she was better off here—"

  "Wait—doctor—where did they say they were taking her?"

  "They had papers from a private hospital in another city, where there were physicians they knew. Legally, since she was stable, I couldn't refuse."

  Legroeder's grip tightened on the phone pad. "Is she gone yet?"

  "Hold on, let me check. I'm not on that floor right now."

  Legroeder asked Harriet, "How fast can you get me to the hospital?"

  Harriet touched her earring and began muttering urgently.

  Dr. Goldman returned to the phone. "Apparently they arrived just a few minutes ago to check her out."

  "Stop them!"

  "Well, I can try, but I—"

  "You have to! I'm on my way. Don't let them take her!" Before the doctor could reply, Legroeder lunged for the door.

  "Wait, I'm coming with you!" Harriet called. "Morgan, keep copying this material!"

  The ride to the hospital with Peter's man took ten frantic minutes. Legroeder jumped out ahead of Harriet and dashed through the lobby and up to the third floor. "Maris O'Hare! Is she still here?" he cried, running past the front desk.

  "Sir! Just a moment!"

  Legroeder ignored the shout and rounded the corner to Maris's room. He stopped, panting, inside the doorway. "Maris?" he shouted. The bed was empty, stripped. He turned. "Where is she?"

  "Sir!" A nurse was behind him, followed by a robot security guard. "Please come this way. If you want to talk to—"

  "Dr. Goldman! Where's Dr. Goldman?"

  "Dr. Goldman's not—"

  "I'm right here," said a voice from down the hall. The doctor hurried into view. "I tried to call you. I wasn't able to stop them."

  "What?"

  "I'm very sorry—they were gone by the time I got downstairs."

  "Damn it to hell!" Legroeder clenched his fists, fingernails biting into his hands.

  "I really am sorry. But they identified themselves as closest kin. They had the right to insist. I simply had no legal authority to hold her here."

  "Damn the legal authority!"

  The doctor drew back. "Excuse me, I know you're upset..."

  Legroeder took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. He could feel the blood pounding in his head. It would do no good to scream at the doctor. "I'm sorry—what hospital did you say they were taking her to?"

  The doctor checked his compad. "Symmes. In the town of Arlmont in the Northern Province."

  "And you did verify that this hospital was expecting her?"

  "Mr. MacAffee showed us the admission order, yes."

  "But did you call the hospital?"

  The doctor looked pale, both defensive and frightened. "There seemed no need. All of the documentation was in order. Mr. Legroeder, are you sure that—"

  "I'm telling you those people were not her family! I don't care about their documents. They were not her brother and sister!" Legroeder turned with helpless fury to Harriet, who had finally caught up.

  "Then who were they?" Dr. Goldman shook his head in dismay. "If this was an abduction, we'd better call the police at once." He turned to the robot guard. "Check the door security. See if there's a record of the vehicle that Ms. O'Hare left in."

  Harriet spoke quickly. "We'll need that, and we'll need all of the purported documentation." She pulled at her earring and spoke subvocally for a moment.

  "May I ask who you are?" Dr. Goldman said.

  "Harriet Mahoney, attorney at law," she said brusquely. "Doctor, there will certainly be a legal investigation into this matter, and it is paramount that all of the documents be preserved. We'll need to examine them for evidence of forgery."

  The doctor's alarm deepened visibly. "Yes, of course. But hadn't we better concentrate on getting the police on this?"

  "Absolutely. Please do that. We'll be in touch. But right now, we must see if we can put a pursuit on that vehicle."

  "They told me they were headed for the Northern Province," Dr. Goldman said.

  "Then they probably aren't. Legroeder, let's move quickly. Thank you, Doctor." Without waiting for anyone to reply, Harriet seized Legroeder above the elbow and propelled him down the hall toward the lift and the exit. "If there's any more to learn here, Peter and his people will learn it. I don't think we want to be here when the police arrive."

  "Are we going after the car that took Maris?"

  "Peter's getting someone on it right now. But Legroeder—understand there's very little chance of catching them. If they could produce papers to fool the hospital, then they aren't going to be waiting around for us to catch them."

  "But we've got to do everything we can—"

  "We will, Legroeder. We will." Harriet steered him out a side exit onto the street. In front of the hospital, a police flyer's lights were flashing. As they strode away quickly, she added, "But we'll let the people do it who can do it. You, my friend, have other business. And no time to delay, before the police start to suspect you." She shook her head worriedly. "And what am I doing? Helping you to become a fugitive? God. There's the car..."

  * * *

  Legroeder slumped in a chair in Harriet's office, picking with a pair of chopsticks at a nearly empty carton of Fabri takeout food. An hour ago, he had been starving; now he had no appetite.

  Morgan glanced at him sympathetically. She was still busy copying and scanning the hundreds of pages of material they had brought from McGinnis's house. The data on the cube had already been encoded and distributed for safekeeping on the net.

  Legroeder started as Harriet snapped off her phone; he must have dozed off. "You were right, Legroeder. There is no Symmes Hospital in the town of Arlmont. The town itself is nothing more than a trading post for lumbering interests in the northern forest."

  Legroeder grunted, unsurprised. Maris really was gone, then. Either dead... or in the hands of the same people who had tried to kill him.

  "Peter will give a report to the police, of course. But I doubt they'll be able to do much." Harriet consulted her notes, then continued grimly, "We need to think very carefully about what your next move should be."

  "Meaning—"

  "Meaning, whoever these people are, they seem to have connections in more places than I'd guessed. We may not be safe here for long." Harriet ran her fingers through her hair in agitation. "But who the hell are they? Someone in Spacing Authority? Some outside group? There's a note here from Peter. It seems that spaceship hangar where Jakus Bark worked is owned indirectly by Centrist Strength. I wonder if they're involved."

  "Centrist Strength again! Where do these people come from?" Legroeder asked in annoyance.

  Harriet looked as if she had a bad taste in her mouth. "Mainly Faber Eridani, though there've been rumors of offworld connections outside their own organization. It began years ago as a particularly strident, and racist, lobbying group—then they started getting into paramilitary activities. Their members all have military-type ranks and titles. And they've got wilderness training camps—which is where they're causing that trouble with the Faber aborigines I told you about. Lately, they seem to have been trying to improve their public image, but I haven't heard of any change in their human-supremacist outlook."

  "I wonder how Jakus got mixed up with them."

  "Good question. And I wonder how, or if, they're connected with your problem."

  Legroeder grimaced. "May I make a suggestion?"

  "By all means."

  "We're not going to solve this by wondering. Let's contact that Narseil historian that McGinnis told us about. El'ken. Maybe he knows some things. And we've got to read the rest of this material. What are we doing for security?" Legroeder looked aro
und, as if terrorists might leap out of the closet.

  "Peter is proofing my house right now," Harriet said. "I think we'll be safe there for the time being. He's the best in the business. Morgan, you're staying with us."

  Morgan nodded, sorting pages.

  "Then let's study while we can. And let Peter do his work."

  * * *

  Peter met them at the office to escort them to Harriet's house. Among humans, Peter was the only name he used. He was a Clendornan—a silver-blue-skinned humanoid with a wedge-shaped head, wide and flat on top. His nose was all angles, and his eyes looked like clear orbs with luminous steel wool at the backs of the eyeballs. He smiled only once, briefly—a zigzag smile beneath an angular brow, and then was all sober concentration. He had two bodyguards with him—a long-armed, almost tentacled Gos'n named Georgio; and a Swert named Pew, a brawny individual with a head like a horse's and an astringent smell. "We take no chances from now on," Peter said, after introductions. "We've scanned your house, I'll leave Georgio and Pew to look after you for the night, and I'll stay in touch with them, but I have many investigations to undertake tonight. Are you ready to go?" The words spilled out of his mouth like marbles out of a bag.

  "We need to get these spare copies stored safely," said Harriet, showing him the datacubes.

  "The bank vaults won't be open at this hour. But if we each keep a cube, that will give us a measure of security. You've dispersed a copy on the worldnet, right? Good—and the originals?"

  "Right here. Peter, we might need to make a trip to the asteroid belt. Can you arrange that?"

  Peter blinked; the effect was like a lighted sign going off and on. "I can arrange it if necessary." He peered at Legroeder. "Is it your intention to become a fugitive?"

  "Could I be more of a fugitive than I am now?"

  Harriet cleared her throat. "I believe Peter's reminding us of your bail conditions—namely, that you won't leave the planet. And of my responsibility, as your attorney, not to encourage you to violate the law. Is that correct, Peter?"

  The PI turned up his long-fingered hands. "I'm not trying to tell you what to do. But I wanted to remind you, not just of Mr. Legroeder's bail, but of the fact that he is a potential suspect in both the disappearance of Jakus Bark and the possible death of Robert McGinnis. It would not appear to help his case for him to vanish from the planet. That is the sort of thing that fugitives do, no?"