by Mike Resnick
“I've seen better.”
“I'll wager you've never seen worse.”
“You're young yet,” said Nighthawk. “I hope you never meet worse.”
“He really wants me dead?”
“He insists on it.”
She stood silent and motionless for a moment. “It's strange.”
“What is?”
“He may be a monster, but he's still my father. The thought that he could want me dead...” She shook her head and shuddered.
“You want him dead,” Nighthawk noted mildly.
“That's different. I've hated him my whole life.”
“Maybe it's mutual.”
“It couldn't be. How do you hate an infant? A little girl? He hardly knows me. How could he hate me so much?”
“I don't think he hates you,” said Nighthawk. “I think you just annoy him.”
“That's even worse!” she said. “To kill someone because she annoys you!”
“There are worse reasons,” said Nighthawk. “Besides, it's just a guess.”
“Probably an accurate one,” replied Cassandra. “He doesn't know me well enough to hate me. In fact, when he finds out who Ibn ben Khalid really is, you may not have to kill him; the shock may do it for you.”
“Try not to think about it.”
“How can I stop thinking about it?” she demanded. “He's my father!”
“Just a toss of a coin. He could be anyone's father, you could be anyone's daughter.”
“I don't believe that for a moment. Do you?”
“Not really. You've got some of his steel, a touch of his arrogance.”
“I do?”
Nighthawk nodded. “I find them admirable qualities when they're not carried to excess.”
“Thank you, I suppose.”
“You've got his eyes, too.”
“His are gray, mine are blue.”
“Neither of you ever look away or blink. You're not afraid of what you see.”
“Why should I be?”
“I'm the Widowmaker. I came here to kill you. And he has to know I've considered killing him.”
“I'd rather you pointed out the differences between us,” said Cassandra. “I hate the man.”
“Well, you're a lot prettier.”
She grimaced. “That's not what I meant.”
“So much for romance,” said Nighthawk wryly.
“I never expected a killer to be a romantic.”
“Nonsense,” answered Nighthawk. “Killers make the best romantics.”
“Sure.”
“We do,” he insisted. “Sooner or later we have to convince ourselves that what we're doing is necessary, and ultimately good. What's more romantic than that?”
“Then why don't you stop this incessant talking and take me to bed?”
He stared at her, surprised. “Are you sure that's what you want? You don't know me.”
“You're an attractive man. I'm an attractive woman. And we're both going to be dead in less that two weeks.” She paused. “Blue Eyes isn't the only one who can compute the odds, you know. So we might as well make the most of it while we can.”
Nighthawk got to his feet. “Sounds good to me.”
He followed her to the bedroom.
“I plan to enjoy this,” she said firmly.
“I'll do my best.”
“How long has it been for you?”
He grinned at her as he began taking off his clothes. “Oh, a century, maybe a little longer.”
“I hope you haven't forgotten how.”
He hadn't.
25.
Nighthawk was sitting in the Blue Dragon three days later when Kinoshita entered and walked over to him.
“Mind if I sit down?” he asked.
“Be my guest.”
“I saw your ship take off yesterday.” Pause. “I guess you weren't on it.”
“Not much gets past you, does it?” remarked Nighthawk dryly.
“I thought you might want to tell me about it.”
“Not especially,” said Nighthawk, sipping his drink.
“You refuse to?”
“I didn't say that.”
“Well?”
“It's a decoy.”
“Part of a plan you worked out with Cassandra Hill, I take it?” said Kinoshita.
“Do I detect a note of disapproval?” asked Nighthawk.
“Damn it, we're part of your team, me and Melisande and the aliens!” said Kinoshita angrily. “We all know you're sleeping with her, and nobody minds it, but we do mind being left out in the cold. If something's going on, if we're expected to risk our lives for her cause—her cause, not ours—then we think you should let us know just what's going on.”
Nighthawk stared at him. Kinoshita looked at his expressionless face and cold eyes, and for just a moment he had an impulse to race for the door and consider himself lucky if he made it.
“All right,” said Nighthawk at last. “Fair is fair. You've got a point.” He paused long enough to finish his drink and signal the bartender for another. “We're going to invade Pericles and take out Cassius Hill.”
“We?” repeated Kinoshita. “You mean her army?”
Nighthawk shook his head. “Her army, such as it is, is ragtag, undisciplined, poorly armed, and spread all the hell over the Inner Frontier. More to the point, it's outnumbered four-to-one. If we approached the planet with it, we'd be blown out of the sky before our first ship could land.”
“Then who's invading Pericles?”
“Us.”
“Us?” repeated Kinoshita with a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach.
“You, me, her, Melisande, Friday, Blue Eyes, Jory, and maybe twenty of her most trusted men and women.”
“Just a minute,” said Kinoshita. “You're going to invade Cassius Hill's heavily-guarded home world with an attack force of thirty men?”
“And women,” said Nighthawk.
“You're good, Widowmaker,” said Kinoshita. “Better than I thought, better than anyone I've ever seen. But you're nowhere near that good.”
“I appreciate your confidence.”
“It's not a matter of confidence,” insisted Kinoshita. “It's a matter of numbers.”
“Actually, it's a matter of planning.”
“Cassius Hill has four million men on that planet. I don't care how widely dispersed they are. I don't care if half of them will be asleep. I don't care if he's isolated in his mansion with only ten thousand crack soldiers guarding him.” Kinoshita paused and tried to regain his composure. “Look, even if you kill him, we've still got to get away from there. What'll we have—one ship? Three? Five? Against his entire fleet and his planetary defense system?”
“I've worked out some of the problems,” said Nighthawk. “We won't move until I work out the rest.”
“What about Cassandra?” continued Kinoshita.
“What about her?”
“I got the impression you cared about her.”
“I do—not that it's any of your business.”
“You can't,” said Kinoshita, “or you wouldn't let her risk her life like this.”
“You're a fool, Ito,” said Nighthawk slowly. “It's not up to me to stop her. More to the point, I care about her precisely because she's willing to come along and risk her life for a cause she believes in.”
“Can you trust her to do the right thing under pressure?”
“More than I trust anyone else. She's Ibn ben Khalid, isn't she?”
“You sound like you find that attractive,” suggested Kinoshita.
“Out here on the Frontier the two things that count are courage and competence,” said Nighthawk, “and she has them both. I'm glad that she's a good-looking woman, but I'd be just as attracted to her if she was 300 pounds and pock-marked.”
“Curious.”
“What is?”
“I'd have thought that a man who lives for the moment would be more concerned with style than substance.”
“What makes yo
u think I live for the moment?” asked Nighthawk.
“Your profession.”
“Never planning more than a moment at a time would be an admission of defeat,” replied Nighthawk. “The first Widowmaker made it to his sixties, and if they come up with a cure for eplasia, he could make it to 100. He never once thought that he might die in the course of earning his living. I know: his memories are mine.” He paused. “I want a woman with those same virtues—courage and competence. I found one.” Another pause. “I'll tell you something else: it's more important to me that she reads books than that she's good in bed.”
“Sure it is,” said Kinoshita sardonically.
“Sooner or later you have to stop fucking and start talking,” said Nighthawk. “I want someone who won't bore me to tears, someone to exchange ideas with.”
“You are a constant source of amazement to me,” admitted Kinoshita.
“That's because you bought into the myth. You think I live for killing—whereas what I really cherish are the hours and days between killings.”
“Point taken.”
“Is there anything else you want to ask?” said Nighthawk. “Let's get it over with now, because I don't plan to discuss my personal business with you again.”
“Just that it seems a waste,” said Kinoshita. “The rest of us have our reasons for following you, but if you care for Cassandra, why send her up against heavily-armed soldiers?”
“You keep forgetting that this is her cause. I'm just in it for the money.” He paused. “Besides, whether she weighs 110 pounds or 310 pounds, a gun is a hell of an equalizer.”
“Okay, then I've got another question for you.”
“I'm listening.”
“What am I in it for?” asked Kinoshita. “She's in it to overthrow her father, and so are Jory and Blue Eyes. You're in it for the money. Melisande is here because you're paying her. Friday's here because he can't wait to blow up a few thousand Men. But what am I here for?”
“I thought you came along to watch me in action,” remarked Nighthawk dryly.
“I know why I came this far,” said Kinoshita irritably. “But why do you want me to come the rest of the way? I know you, Widowmaker—you never leave anything to chance. If you want me along, there's got to be a reason. I think I deserve to know what it is.”
“Fair question,” answered Nighthawk. “Your job is to stay alive.”
Kinoshita frowned. “I don't understand.”
“If only one person survives this operation, it has to be you.”
"Me?" said Kinoshita, surprised. “Why?”
“Because you're the only one who's both trustworthy and knowledgeable enough to transfer the money I plan to appropriate into the Widowmaker's account at Hubbs, Wilkinson, Raith and Jiminez, and to make sure that Marcus Dinnisen and none of the others try to divert it for their own use.”
“You don't trust them?”
“They're lawyers, aren't they?” replied Nighthawk, making no attempt to hide his contempt.
“How much money are we talking about?”
“At least five million, hopefully more. Your fee for seeing that it gets where it belongs will be ten percent.”
Kinoshita grinned. “Suddenly I'm less opposed to attacking Pericles.”
“Somehow I thought you might be.”
“But I still don't understand someone who'd let the woman he loves go in there with guns blazing.”
“No one's going anywhere with guns blazing,” said Nighthawk. “This is not an enemy we can overpower.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I know exactly what you mean. Some men put women on a pedestal. I prefer to work side by side with them. My work just happens to be more dangerous than most.”
Kinoshita shrugged. “Okay, I'm all through arguing. Do what you want with her. I can hardly object to your plans when I'm the designated survivor.”
“I plan on all of us living through this,” said Nighthawk. “You're just the one we're going to make absolutely sure survives.”
“I appreciate it. When do we attack?”
“Not for awhile. First, I want to make sure that a sizeable number of Hill's ships are following mine.”
“Where is it headed?”
“Socrates VII.”
“That's clear across the Inner Frontier!”
“Right. And second, as I said, I have to work out the rest of the details.” Nighthawk paused. “We should be ready in six or seven Standard days.”
“I hate to say this...”
“Yes?”
“Quite seriously,” said Kinoshita with obvious reluctance, “if you're going to protect someone's ass, make it Melisande's. You won't need an empath in a pitched battle. You might need me.”
“That's a generous offer,” said Nighthawk. “But I'll definitely need an empath.”
“You're sure?”
“I'm sure.”
“Then I guess I'll just have to live,” said Kinoshita with a smile. “How much of this can I tell the others?”
“I'll be speaking to each of them myself in the next day or two,” said Nighthawk. “We have a lot of details to sort out.”
Kinoshita observed him thoughtfully. “You don't seem overly nervous.”
“Should I be?”
“Well, you're about to take on four million soldiers with a handful of untrained men, and to try to assassinate the best-protected politician on the Inner Frontier,” replied Kinoshita. “That would make most men a little nervous.”
“Most men,” agreed Nighthawk.
“But not you?”
“Not the Widowmaker,” was the calm reply.
26.
Melisande walked up to Nighthawk, who was standing in the street outside the Blue Dragon.
“You sent for me?” she said.
“Yes, I did,” replied Nighthawk. “I need to know more about your power.”
“Being a Balatai woman isn't so much a power as a curse,” she replied. “You don't know what it's like to be bombarded by emotions every day of your life.”
“Do you?”
She frowned. “What are you driving at?”
“Can you get away from them?”
“Sometimes.”
“What's the closest someone can get before you can't avoid his emotions?”
“It depends on what he's feeling as well as his proximity,” answered Melisande.
“That's not good enough.”
“Why don't you tell me what you want, and I'll try to answer you.”
“All right,” said Nighthawk. “Pretend you're in the middle of a desert or a farm field, and there's a man a mile away, walking toward you. You can't see him. He's not mad at anyone. He's not frightened. He's not thinking lustful thoughts about his woman. He's not bursting with joy. He's just walking, his mind's kind of drifting, he's not noticing much of anything. How close would he have to be before you knew he was there?”
“I don't know,” she said. “I might see him before I sensed him.”
“It's midnight and this world doesn't have any moons.”
“I assume there's a purpose to all this?” said Melisande.
“I wouldn't ask if there wasn't,” replied Nighthawk. “Could you sense him at 500 yards?”
“I don't know.”
“300?”
“Damn it, I don't know!”
“Well, we're going to have to find out.” He gestured toward the Blue Dragon. “How many men are in there right now?”
She closed her eyes and the muscles in her face tightened as she concentrated.
“Seven.”
“Six,” said Nighthawk.
“I sense emotional radiations from seven.”
“There's a bartender and five men.”
“You're wrong.”
“Oh—right. I forgot Cassandra. She's upstairs. Can you differentiate?”
“Can I tell that one of the seven is on the second floor? Not from out here, but when I'm inside I can.”
Nighthawk took her by the arm and walked her one hundred yards down the street.
“Can you still read their radiations?” he asked.
“Of course.”
“How many are there?”
She concentrated again, then looked at him, surprised. “Four.”
“That's right. I told three of them to leave when they saw me walking you over here. Let's go a little further.”
He stopped 200 yards from the tavern, and she stared at it.
“Six?”
“Are you asked me or telling me?”
She lowered her head for a moment, then looked up at him. “Six,” she said firmly.
“Once more,” he said, walking her another hundred yards away.
“Two,” she said when they had stopped.
“You're sure?”
“Yes.”
Nighthawk made a gesture, and Kinoshita walked out of the tavern and jabbed the air three times with a thumb.
“You missed one,” said Nighthawk.
“Have I failed some kind of test?”
“Not at all,” he replied. “We just had to know where your limit was. It seems to be somewhere between two and three hundred yards, at least when no one's pitching any powerful emotions.”
“All right,” said Melisande. “Now that we know that, what are we supposed to do about it?”
“Ito will help you try to narrow it down even farther over the next few days,” answered Nighthawk.
“And then?”
“And then, when we infiltrate Pericles V, you are going to be Friday's alarm system.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“He's going to have to create a number of distractions. While he's planting his explosives, he's not going to be able to concentrate on anything else. You're going to let him know if anyone's coming.”
“But why this experiment?” she asked. “If an armed guard thinks he hears something, or that he's spotted something, he'll radiate much stronger emotions, and...”
“We'll try to adjust for that,” interrupted Nighthawk. “In the next couple of days, Ito will try to dope out your limits for men who are angry, or lustful, or frightened. But the most likely scenario, assuming we plan this properly, is that someone will be much more likely to stumble onto you by accident. So now we know if he's just patrolling an area that he patrols every night, and he has no reason to believe anyone's there, and you can spot his emotional radiation, he's probably within two hundred yards of you. That means you'll have to dope out some kind of signal with Friday that will either get him to freeze until the man passes, or kill him before he sees you.”