Moro's Price

by M. Crane Hana

Mortal allegiances took on bizarre importance to a creature whose idea of family most often meant prey or predator. Concepts of outrage, vengeance, and sorrow resonated within her. She felt on the cusp of a great secret, longing for it, unable to reach it. She was aware her siblings probably had done so already and were laughing at her from a safe distance across the galaxy.

  Someday soon, she would kill Aiyon for his mockery.

  She calmed her breathing again. She read the reports her operatives had gathered over years of searching. The report Savi had written just a few hours ago, after Aiyon’s disclosures, left her in a murderous fury.

  She’d taken out her spite on poor Savi until she had to flee from Imraithi’s weak little body into something adequately expressing her emotions: her true form, brutally devouring the mindless hulk of an ancient sun.

  Now she blinked away an uncomfortable moisture gathering in her eyes. Looking up from mere words on a screen, she caught sight of a still, sepia-toned image framed in dark brown wood.

  She lifted the small image off the bookshelf, studying it.

  Imraithi’s genetic daughter turned partly away from the recorder. The young Sonta woman smiled up at a tall man with tousled, slightly lighter hair, dark eyes, and a big-jawed square face. Obviously a round-eared Terrani, the man wore black Sonta armor and garb as if born to it.

  Aksenna bent to brush mortal lips across both frozen faces and carefully replaced the image on the shelf. “I know why you ran from me, dear children,” she whispered. “I’m sorry. If I had looked for you sooner, Aiyon would never have had time to play his games. I will avenge you!”

  Later she would consider seducing Savi again, more gently and in apology, since he’d recovered so well in just a few short hours.

  Nineteen

  “I AM OFFERING a reward of fifty million credits to anyone who can lead me to Moro. Thank you for your time,” Lyton Sardis finished.

  A pause, then a hubbub of voices as excited journalists added their take to the developing saga.

  Sardis turned to retreat into the building, but a woman’s clear voice rang strong and sharp above the crowd. “Sero Sardis, I am Deljou Shannon of Channel 98. How does your ex-wife feel about you wanting to marry a man? I’ve read she is heavily involved in the Terra Prima movement, and they still frown on homosexual relationships.”

  Sardis reined in his anger, let his shoulders droop a little more, and turned back to face his challenger.

  He didn’t know the journalist. Even this late at night, she wore an immaculate suit and discreet jewelry. Her reddish-brown skin and well-styled brown hair might belong to any of a dozen post-Terran genotypes in the League. Her attractive face showed neither sympathy nor antagonism but alert calm.

  “My ex-wife and I grew apart after a long marriage, in which we fulfilled the natural genetic obligations her faith demanded,” Sardis explained. “I was never a dues-paying member of Terra Prima, nor did I attend any of their meetings with her. Since she is still a major shareholder in Rio Sardis, we speak often, but only in a professional capacity. I realized my true affections only years after we divorced. She has met Moro and given her reluctant but honest approval of the match.”

  The Shannon woman grinned at him during the moment her peers still tried to gauge his response. Then she asked, “Sero Sardis, what really happened on Ventana?”

  Twenty

  THE BROWN JACKET had a tan lining, tailored well enough to avoid looking like a lining. Hegen walked out of the aerial train’s lavatory three minutes after he went in, adjusting the shoulder strap of his medic’s bag. At least the bag didn’t carry a corporate logo or name.

  He’d prepared several excuses for the change. At this time of night, he drew only blank, incurious stares from the other passengers heading north toward the city center.

  One small holo screen at each end of the thirty-foot cabin broadcast a late-night talk show, a program Hegen would have turned off or silenced if he could.

  “And let’s look at those spitting Camels,” said the round-faced host, tapping on a screen beside him. It shimmered and then showed a daytime shot of Cedar’s Camalian Embassy up near the university. A white flag emblazoned with the Commonwealth’s amber-and-green sunburst flew over the steel and white stone building.

  “This is the face they show to us now. Peaceful. Civilized. Respectable.” The visual changed to an elaborate state dinner in the Premier’s Palace and a close-up of the elderly premier sitting next to a striking dark-skinned woman in burnt-orange silk. Her lower face was covered in the same fabric; her gloved fingers toyed with an untouched glass of white wine while everyone else enjoyed the luxurious banquet. “We trade with them,” said the host. “We let their children go to school with our kids, as long as the so-called Camalians are decently masked. But how many of you know they stole a whole world from us, back when humans had just left Old Earth?”

  Grainy images from over two thousand years before showed cities in flames. Rickety starships lifted off far too close to each other. Men, women, and children huddled in ship corridors, packed too tightly to sit down. “This was Terra Prima. Our second home. It belonged to all of humanity, our brand-new Earth,” snapped the host as the video switched back to his reddening face. “They were godless, so they wouldn’t tolerate the many faiths enriching the human race. They worshipped science, so they mocked the mysteries of God. They thought a planet was more important than people, so they demanded we control our development of Terra Prima’s fresh resources. Five billion people were too many, they said. We locked them away on one little island on the equator, and the rest of humanity just thought they were harmless crackpots.

  “But their filthy bargain with a demon from outer space gave them the edge when they wanted the whole planet. With their demon’s help, they made an unstoppable artificial virus with a nearly perfect kill rate. They told us they’d infect the whole planet if we didn’t leave. Two human cities were infected as a test. The people who didn’t die became demons themselves, capable of spreading their plague. So humans destroyed those cities and evacuated again. And now the spitting Camels call humanity’s second home Camonde. Cama’s World.”

  The holo showed a modern spaceport shot of Camalians in their distinctive amber uniforms, orange-masked and gloved, hauling cargo down a gangway. “Folks, this is what didn’t bother to break bread with our premier last night. This is what has spread to ten rich planets in the Camalian Commonwealth, whose wealth is really siphoned from honest human merchants. Ship captains pay to use those alien safe routes or go the long way through some of the most dangerous parts of the galaxy.”

  The host shut off his display screen and wagged a concerned finger at his audience. “After so many centuries, can they really be considered ‘human’ anymore? They still use tricks and extortion, scaring good humans into backing off our rightful expansion into space with fairy stories about the Big Bad Sonta waiting out there to stomp on us. Well, do the Sonta even exist? Space-elves? Really? Has anyone ever seen one? Supposedly the Camels brokered the last “treaty” we had, a hundred years ago. But you and I both know nutcases like the Camels can wear scary black armor and veils as well as bright-orange masks. How do we know who was Camel and who was Sonta at the summit? Your politicians sure don’t want to tell you. So folks, look out for those orange masks, and keep yourselves safe. This is Mark David Moore, signing off on another Timely Warning!”

  Far too late, the holo shifted to a grocery-store advertisement.

  Mutters swelled around the cabin. Hegen didn’t like the undertone. He was no Camalian sympathizer, but Moore’s tirade didn’t quite fit the facts he knew from school.

  “I heard they self-destruct after death,” said one tired-looking woman with chapped red hands. “Don’t even leave bodies or bones for the Good Lord to collect on Resurrection Day.”

  “Sssh, Melissy,” said her seatmate, an elderly man in an oil-stained uniform. “Who’d want to risk spilling demon blood on themselves to find out?”

>   “Could do it if you’re careful,” said another man in a cheap business suit and an overfull briefcase. “Untraceable. Would it be murder if you could show self-defense?”

  Hegen kept silent. People had the right to talk, to blow off steam. It wasn’t his fight.

  The aerial train slowed into the next stop, and a new batch of riders hurried on. The first was a tight group of eight burly dockworkers trying to move as one, staying six or seven feet ahead of a tiny family group.

  A short, delicate woman still wore an electronic assembler’s clean-room coveralls and tool belt, her clear safety hood folded back over curly dark brown hair. She carried a blond toddler in the crook of her right arm, and her left hand clenched on the handle of a wheeled plastic tote. A small boy, sharing her hair and green slanted eyes, struggled with another tote almost as big as he was.

  All three of them, even the fussing baby, wore bright-orange masks and gloves.

  The woman angled her left wrist for the fee scanner, three times, and it chimed to announce paid passage. She looked around for a place to stand.

  Hegen felt sour acid sputter in his throat as the car’s sullen and primed occupants realized a Camalian family was among them. Whatever the Camalians had been thousands of years ago, the ones he knew about were staunch pacifists. There’d be blood and fire in this cabin if he didn’t break the mood.

  He stepped forward smoothly, offering the Camalian woman his isolated spot with a gesture and a curt, barely polite bow. “Sera, I’ve been looking for you for an hour. You’re late, you’re on the wrong car, and you’re three stops down from where you were supposed to be. If I’m to escort you and your brood to the clinic every week”—he glared at the children—“you’ll have to be more prompt.”

  “Yes, Sero,” she sighed, meekly dipping her head in a lower bow.

  “What’s going on?” asked the inquisitive Melissy.

  Hegen gave her a deeper bow. “My apologies, Sera. We were supposed to be in a private taxi tonight. I’m Dr. Hegen, and I’m here to escort these people to a Ministry of Health clinic, where their masks must be certified for safety issues. There was a complaint last year.” To the Camalian woman, he said, “Sera, we have to leave this car at the next station. Our transport is standing by.” He let one eyelid drop in the tiniest possible wink.

  Her wary expression never faltered, but she bowed again.

  “Yes, Sero Hegen.”

  Her son’s mouth opened. The boy looked startled for a moment and then shut his mouth quickly.

  “Thank you, Doctor,” said Melissy, smiling at Hegen. “Can’t be too careful, these days. You’re a brave man.”

  “It’s just my job, Sera. I apologize for everyone’s inconvenience.”

  They escaped at the next stop. When the seven-car train pulled away from the deserted platform, Hegen pointed at the darker street below the metal-mesh stairs. “Down there, fast, but don’t stumble or draw attention. Act like you belong here.”

  “Ama,” began the boy.

  “Do as he says, Phillipe,” said the woman with a bright-eyed glance at Hegen. He had the feeling she spoke aloud only for his benefit. “The good doctor just saved us from a bad moment, I suspect.”

  Hegen collected the totes and followed. Once they reached the street, he pulled her and the boy into an even more shadowy corner. “I’m sorry about this, Sera, but you and your little ones have to ditch the masks and gloves, just for now. Don’t drop them!” he told the boy. “If you do, someone will know there’s a Camalian family gone rogue. Hide them in your luggage. We’ll get on the next northbound train as ordinary passengers.”

  “Isn’t that illegal?” asked the woman.

  “Against the law is better than maimed or dead,” Hegen said. “Moore is stirring up tensions on an already bad night. Where were you going so late?”

  “Our embassy,” said the woman, clenching her fists and obviously not wanting to say more.

  Hegen placed her destination at least eight hundred miles north. This local train moved only thirty miles per hour at best and circulated back south in less than twenty miles. Impossible. “How were you getting there?”

  “Once we left the neighborhood I was going to hire an automated taxi at the next big hub. It’s worth all the credits we have,” said the woman.

  Hegen tallied up the totes, the woman’s well-hidden worry, the sharper fear on the boy’s face, and the transport eating every bit of their money. They were running and not coming back.

  “I have more than enough credits to cover it,” said Hegen, blessing his generous unknown contact and Kott’s bequest. “I am Dr. Adam Hegen. I hate seeing unnecessary violence,” he said, inwardly cringing at the bloodstained memories of his last four years as one of Kott’s medics.

  “I’m Johani Richeson ne’Cama,” she said, holding out a bare hand. “This is Phillipe, and little Tomas.”

  Hegen took her hand with no fear. “I’m not part of your family. I wouldn’t pass as one under even casual inquiry. So I’m a concerned neighbor escorting you north. To where, nearest the embassy?”

  “Kino Hospital,” she mused. “I can say Tomas needs treatment for a pollen allergy.”

  “Then why the loaded totes?” Hegen asked. “If someone asks?”

  “It can be a long wait, even in the designated Camalian waiting rooms.” Johani looked as if she spoke from experience.

  They had every detail down when the next train glided up to the station.

  Twenty-One

  EVERY FRAGILE MOMENT stretched to breaking as Val dressed in his ruined tunic and trousers. He wadded up the cheap cellulose sheet to hide the bloodstains and tossed the fabric under the table.

  The shower stopped. Val waited for a minute. He saw the pale-pink and black blur of a tall body brushing against the frosted plastic. Val was glad it wasn’t clear. He hadn’t needed to watch Moro be violently ill. Bad enough hearing the man’s low hisses and groans as he cleaned himself again.

  But they were running out of time. “Moro,” he called into the dripping silence. “We have to go.”

  Then Val turned his back on the shower, the fresh towels he’d just bought with their dwindling credit, and the stolen clothing he’d brushed off with more disinfectant wipes. Busying himself with alternating swigs from a water bottle and one of the almond-flavored nutrient drinks, Val didn’t look up when he heard the door slowly open.

  He remembered being four years old, terrified of Aunt Alys’s fierce new hounds. She’d brought the beasts back from some long off-world mission, and now all ten of them followed her and Val’s mother everywhere in the palace.

  “Now, Valier, don’t look directly in their eyes,” Alys had warned, taking pity on his fear. “That’s challenge, to nearly every sort of beast. You have my scent on you, so they know you must be part of my pack. Speak kindly without looking at them, and hold out a hand, just so. Sooner or later one of them will nudge its head under your fingers.”

  Two of the huge black and tan monsters had decided Val’s tiny hands were perfect for scratching floppy ears. He could also be counted on to share interesting snacks. His bed was a perfectly good place to settle in the evening. He’d quickly needed a larger bed.

  By the time he’d left for Cedar six years ago, the offspring of Alys’s first ten dogs were a new breed the Camalians nicknamed knifehounds after the beasts’ first mistress.

  From such early experiments, grown-up Val assumed he could charm anything or anyone.

  That’s me. Techno-geek, pervert, and champion of strays and lost causes, Val thought now. Well, no denying he’d surpassed all previous antics and transgressions with this one. Camalians were forbidden sexual contact with normal humans. For any outsider to attempt the transformation meant legal waivers, formal revocation of League citizenship, a long season of classes in Camalian history and culture. Nor was there any guarantee of survival at the end.

  The shower door creaked fully open. He heard Moro drying himself off and donning the clothes. With
out looking, Val passed over the opened bottles. “Keep hydrated. The nutrient drink probably won’t come back up when the infection begins to spread.”

  “St-st-stop,” said Moro in his deep, hesitant voice.

  Both bottles were lifted from Val’s hand without a hint of skin contact. Val had allowed a trained killer into a perfect attack position. He didn’t turn around.

  “D-d-don’t w-want t-t-to know,” said Moro. Then a minor miracle happened when Moro’s hand settled on Val’s left shoulder. “V-Val. I-I-I f-forgive y-you. W-w-will y-you f-f-forgive m-me?”

  Val angled his cheek to touch the trembling hand, and it didn’t go away. “Always,” he whispered.

  As Val keyed on the wall screen, Moro’s fingers dug into his shoulder.

  “It’s all right,” Val said, keeping his voice light and even. “I’m on a respectable channel, checking the weather between us and the embassy. If there’s heavy rain, I’ll need to plot in a longer route. I’m going to tie you to me and the cycle. We’ll be in the air for over two and a half hours, even if we don’t get stopped or delayed. At some point, you’ll probably go unconscious. I don’t want you falling before…”

  If Cama rejected Moro as a host, she’d kill him. Her tiny symbionts would burn Moro’s body as fuel for the M-space jump back to Cama’s sanctuary on Camonde. Camalian corpses never lingered long. Val let his explanation fade unsaid as Moro’s hand lifted. Moro didn’t want to know.

  The weather was clear enough for the most direct aerial route, though it would be cold in the middle of the night.

  Four hundred miles north of Vaclav Sector, this channel carried harmless infomercials and lifestyle puff pieces aimed at workers on the night shifts of a twenty-four-hour city. Val took a chance and turned away from its low chatter. He nearly bumped into Moro, who’d drawn closer to him.

  The man’s dark eyes were sunken into bluish-purple eye sockets. Val saw the blue tint on Moro’s thin lips. His skin was so pale the veins showed underneath. Moro’s breath rasped, catching on the fluids building in his chest and throat as his immune system fought uselessly against this newest assault.