by Eric Brown
The millionaire slurred, “No, please...”
Vaughan sliced with the scalpel, making a bloody incision through the man’s chest. Scheering made a low moan of pain and protest, and when Vaughan looked up he saw that the millionaire was weeping.
He pressed down on the rectangular bulge beneath Scheering’s flabby pectoral, and the bloody mind-shield slipped out. He tossed it across the room.
His implant still activated, Vaughan was swamped by a maelstrom of rage and ego, fear and dread. The millionaire knew what was about to happen, and Vaughan read a terrible sense of loss as Scheering began to understand that everything he had worked and schemed for, the power he had accrued over the decades, was quickly coming to an end.
The ego of the man sickened him, and he deactivated his implant. The ensuing mind-silence was an instant relief.
“No,” Scheering moaned. “You can’t do this.”
“Think again, pal.”
Khar stirred in Vaughan’s head.There are no words to thank you enough, my friend. I will be in touch. Goodbye, Vaughan.
Farewell, Vaughan thought, and felt a dizzying heat pass through his head as Khar vacated his mind and lodged itself in Scheering’s consciousness.
Vaughan retrieved the shield and slipped it back under the sliced flesh of Scheering’s chest, then sealed the wound with synthi-flesh. The millionaire struggled, too enfeebled to get to his feet.
“Vaughan...”
It was Scheering’s voice, but modulated, softened.
“Khar?”
“I am in control, Vaughan. If you would assist me...”
Vaughan helped the millionaire to his feet, then eased him onto the chair behind the desk.
Scheering stared at him, and Vaughan told himself that he could detect, somewhere behind the man’s eyes, the tempering sensibility of the alien.
Scheering gestured. “I... I am in full control of Scheering, though to inhabit the mind responsible for such atrocities...” He fell silent, then smiled. “To have such power at one’s fingertips,” he said, “such means to effect good in the galaxy...”
Vaughan said, “What will the world think when Scheering becomes an altruist?”
Khar-in-Scheering smiled. “That,” he said, “will be very interesting.”
Vaughan moved around the desk, found the chu where he’d dropped it and pulled the mask over his head.
He reached out and shook the man’s hand. “Goodbye, Khar,” he said.
“I will be in contact, Vaughan. Perhaps you and your family would like to visit Mallory, one day?”
Vaughan nodded. “I’d like that,” he said.
“The blessings of my kind go with you, my friend.”
Vaughan turned and left the study. He walked along the corridor, towards the front door. The heavy appeared, grinning. “The Old Man give you a roasting, huh?”
Vaughan smiled. “Too right, bud,” he said, and stepped through the front door.
The sunlight dazzled, warming him. He crossed the garden, affecting nonchalance as he passed the guards, hurried through the wrought iron gates to the landing pad.
He slipped into the back seat of the air-taxi.
Kapinsky peered at him. “You took your time. I was getting worried.”
He pulled off the chu and passed it to Kapinsky, along with the pistol. “It’s done,” he said, and sat back as the flier lifted, turned and carried him south, towards home.
He felt, suddenly, very light-headed. He thought ahead, to life with Sukara and their daughter. He would throw himself with pleasure into such small-scale domesticity, while on a distant colony world an alien race enjoyed a secure future. It was a dichotomy too wondrous to comprehend.
He stared out through the side window at the Station passing far below, and something in him wanted to laugh out loud in delight.
* * * *
EPILOGUE
FAMILY LIFE
Pham couldn’t stop herself from crying when Sukara passed her the baby.
They were sitting in the sofa bunker in the Level Two apartment. Sukara had arrived home from hospital just an hour earlier.
“Like to hold her, Pham?” Sukara asked.
Pham stared at the tiny, scrunched up baby in the crook of Sukara’s arm. She looked up at Jeff, as if asking his permission. He smiled and gestured for her to go ahead.
Sukara eased the tiny bundle into her arms, and Pham stared at little Li’s tiny face, touched her minuscule fingers, and she wept. Sukara leaned over and kissed the top of her head.
“So beautiful,” Pham murmured.
Jeff’s handset chimed and he accessed the call.
The screen showed the thin face of Lin Kapinsky, Jeff’s business partner. “Hey, Jeff—you heard the news?”
“What?”
“Switch on to Channel Ten.”
Sukara grabbed the controls and zapped the wallscreen across the room. The screen flared, showing an overweight Westerner in a silver-grey suit. He was standing at a dais, flanked by other important-looking men and women, and reading from a softscreen.
“Hey,” Jeff said. “That’s Scheering.”
He looked at Pham and smiled. Scheering was the man who Khar now lived in, she knew. She watched the screen as the man made his speech.
“And therefore the scaled withdrawal of the human population on the former colony world of Mallory will begin at midnight tonight, and from today forward the rights of the sentient beings known as the Hortavans will be recognised as sovereign...” He went on, detailing the exodus.
On Jeff’s screen, Lin Kapinsky said, “Scheering contacted me an hour ago, Jeff. He’s finalised payment for the work you did on Mallory. How does fifty thousand baht sound?”
Jeff smiled. “Should keep the wolf from the door for a while.”
“Of course, I’ll be taking my cut.”
“And me with my growing family,” Jeff smiled.
Lin said, “Oh, I almost forgot about that—congratulations, Jeff. What does it feel like to have a daughter?”
Jeff reached out and stroked Li’s cheek. Then he lifted Pham onto his knee. “Two daughters, Lin. We officially adopted Pham a couple of days ago.”
“Hell, Jeff, you’ll be so busy housekeeping you won’t have time to work for me. Speaking of which...”
“I’m on holiday, Lin.”
The face on the screen smiled. “Sure you are, Jeff. But back next week, okay? We have work to do!”
Jeff laughed and cut the connection.
Pham looked up at him and stroked his unshaven chin. “Fifty thousand baht, Jeff? Ice creams all round?”
Sukara laughed and ruffled Pham’s hair.
“Hey,” Jeff said. “Why not? Let’s find an expensive caf é up top and celebrate, okay?”
His handset chimed again. Pham made out a small, wrinkled face staring out of the screen.
She looked up at Jeff. He seemed amazed. “Breitenbach? Christ, where the hell are you?”
The old man laughed. “Where else?” he said. “Bengal Station.”
“When did you get in?”
“This morning,” Breitenbach said. “It appears I’ve been evicted from Mallory.”
“I’ve just heard the news.”
“You know something? I think I’ll miss those mountains.” The old man laughed. “Anyway, I was hoping we might meet. I want to hear all about what happened.”
“That’ll be great.”
Breitenbach smiled, then said, “I have a lot to thank you for, Mr Vaughan.”
Jeff arranged to meet the old man later that day, and cut the connection.
“Who’s Breitenbach, Jeff?” Pham asked.
“Tell you all about him over ice cream,” he said. He reached out and stroked Sukara’s cheek.
Pham looked down at the tiny baby in her lap. My little sister, she thought. And it came to her with amazement, not for the first time, that she was part of a real and loving family.
The girl who, three months ago, had left Level Tw
enty would never have believed it possible.
Later, with Li swaddled in a papoose on Sukara’s chest and Pham riding on Jeff’s shoulders, they left the apartment and rose into the sunlight.