Blackcollar: The Judas Solution

by Timothy Zahn

  Flynn leaned over. Jensen was dropping in a controlled fall down the ravine, playing out the rope as he lowered himself down. "This is nuts," he muttered under his breath as he sat down on the edge of the hole and prepared to follow.

  "Wait a second," Toby said, hobbling toward him.

  Flynn turned, flinching reflexively as he saw the small but nasty-looking slug pistol in Toby's hand.

  Before he could even reach for his shuriken pouch, though, the old man reversed the weapon, offering him the grip. "They might search the cabin," the other explained. "Don't drop it."

  "I won't," Flynn said, his face warming in embarrassment as he took the weapon and stuck it into his belt.

  "Now get moving," Toby ordered, leaning down and getting his fingers under the edge of the box. "I'll close up behind you."

  Taking a deep breath, Flynn got a grip on the rope and pushed himself off into the abyss.

  For a moment he hung there, fighting back a sudden flood of vertigo and a terrible sense of vulnerability. Hang gliders, even malfunctioning ones, were no big deal to him. But dangling at the end of a rope, with Security above and shattering death below, was a very discomfiting sensation.

  Above him, the diffuse light abruptly shut off as Toby swung the box back into place. Grimacing, Flynn started down.

  To his mild surprise, once he was actually in motion most of the discomfort evaporated. The harness design held him securely, and Jensen's method of threading the rope through it provided enough friction to take most of his weight. It wasn't really any worse than rappelling, he decided as he picked up his pace, with the extra bonus of not having to worry about twisting his ankle as he bounced his way down a building or cliff face.

  Jensen was waiting for him as far down as he could go without actually letting go of the rope. "Good," the blackcollar said as Flynn brought himself to a halt. "Now hook the knotted end around these ropes here." He indicated the technique with his own rope and harness. "That should hold you, though you'll want to keep a hand on it just in case it starts to loosen."

  "Right," Flynn said, copying the other's technique. "I wonder what Toby uses these pulleys for."

  "Probably not much," Jensen said. "Been a while since they've been used."

  "Oh?" Flynn asked, his vertigo threatening to return as he looked up at the floor of the cabin nearly a hundred meters above him. "How long a while?"

  "Don't worry, they'll hold just fine," Jensen assured him. "Nice souvenir."

  "What?"

  "Your new toy," Jensen said, pointing at the gun in Flynn's belt. "Toby give you that?"

  "Oh." Flynn looked down at the weapon. "Yes. He didn't want any visitors catching him with it."

  "I don't blame him," Jensen said, his forehead wrinkling as he gazed at the gun. "Security doesn't like concealable weapons in civilian hands."

  "Security barely tolerates hunting rifles in civilian hands," Flynn countered, studying the other's expression. "Anything wrong?"

  "Not really," Jensen said. "I was just thinking that gun has a definite military look about it."

  Flynn glanced up at the bottom of the cabin. "You think Toby was in the war?"

  "It's possible," Jensen said. "I know that on Plinry, at least, the Ryqril tried to tag all the vets when they took over, particularly the officers. Maybe Toby holed up out here hoping to evade the net."

  Flynn thought about the old man living in a one-room cabin for the past thirty years. "Seems to me the hunt should be over by now."

  Jensen snorted. "It was probably over three to five years after the occupation started," he said. "If he's hiding from the Ryqril, this is serious overkill."

  "Maybe he likes it out here."

  "Or maybe he got the gun some other way," Jensen said, his voice going dark. "Found it, or stole it."

  A chill ran up Flynn's back. "Or killed for it?"

  "Possibly," Jensen agreed grimly. "It might explain why he's still out at the back edge of nowhere."

  "So what do we do?"

  "For now, we stop talking," Jensen said, wincing as he rearranged his harness around his injured ribs.

  "Sound can carry strangely in the mountains."

  "I just hope he's not planning to turn us in," Flynn murmured. "This would be a rotten position to fight from."

  "We'd manage," Jensen assured him, peering upward. "I just hope his visitors don't ask to use the facilities."

  * * *

  Foxleigh was sitting at the table, whittling industriously at a random stick he'd grabbed from the wood bin, when the two Security men arrived.

  Typically, they didn't bother to knock. "Boulder Security," the younger of the two said brusquely, as if their uniforms weren't enough of a clue. "Who are you?"

  "Who wants to know?" Foxleigh countered, not looking up from his carving.

  The man snorted and grabbed the end of Foxleigh's stick. "When I ask you a question—"

  Foxleigh let go of the stick, shifted his grip to the man's wrist, and pulled it sharply downward toward the tabletop. The other stumbled forward, off balance; and as he did so, Foxleigh twisted the knife around to point toward him.

  The man froze with shock and probably astonishment, the knife point no more than ten centimeters from his stomach. "Manners, sonny," Foxleigh said softly. "You'd be surprised how far they get you."

  "Smith?" the kid demanded in a choked tone, his wide eyes staring at the knife.

  "Easy, Griffs," the older man said soothingly. He had his paral-dart gun out, pointing it at Foxleigh.

  "You, too, friend. We're just here to talk."

  "Tell him that," Foxleigh suggested.

  "Everyone just relax," Smith said. "Griffs, apologize to the man."

  "Me?" Griffs demanded. "Smith—"

  "Apologize to the man," Smith said more firmly.

  Griffs glared at Foxleigh, his throat working. "Sorry I grabbed your stick," he said through clenched teeth.

  "There we go," Smith said encouragingly. "Now let him go, okay?"

  "It's all about manners," Foxleigh said, releasing Griffs's wrist.

  Breathing hard, the other took a step back from the table and yanked out his own paral-dart pistol. "Drop it," he snarled.

  "It's dropped," Foxleigh said, laying the knife on the table and folding his arms across his chest. "Now ask your questions and get out."

  "Let's start with your name," Smith said, lowering his gun to point at the floor.

  "I'm called Toby," Foxleigh said.

  "Toby what?" Griffs demanded. His gun, not surprisingly, was still pointed at Foxleigh's face.

  "Just Toby."

  "Look—"

  He broke off at a gesture from Smith. "What do you do up here, Mr. Toby?" the older man asked in a more reasonable tone.

  Foxleigh shrugged. "I live," he said. "Pretty much the same thing you do in the city."

  "I meant, how do you survive?" Smith said. "Food and clothing and all?"

  "There's plenty of game about," Foxleigh said. "I do some hunting and trapping, and I've got a small vegetable plot around the side of the cliff face over there."

  "And the people in Shelter Valley help you out, too, I suppose?"

  Foxleigh grimaced. "Sometimes," he admitted. "Some of them. Only when I can't do for myself."

  "And that's not very often, I imagine," Smith said, glancing around the cabin. "You seem the selfsufficient sort. Tell me, how long have you been up here?"

  Foxleigh shrugged as casually as he could. Here was where things were going to get dicey. "Don't remember exactly," he said vaguely.

  "Since before the war?"

  "Some, I guess," Foxleigh conceded.

  "And you were, what, sixty or so when it began?" Smith persisted.

  It would have been nice to be able to bring that number down to somewhere around thirty, Foxleigh knew. It would line up with his actual age and eliminate a lot of potentially unpleasant questions.

  Unfortunately, there were people in Shelter Valley who might remember the r
eal Toby being in his upper fifties when he turned his back on humanity and moved out on them. "Closer to fifty," he said, fudging the number as far as he could.

  "Which would make you about eighty years old," Smith concluded, peering closely at Foxleigh's face.

  "You're in mighty good shape for a man that age. Especially given the kind of life you lead."

  "Life like this keeps a man healthy," Foxleigh countered. "You soft city folk ought to try it sometime."

  He lifted his eyebrows at Griffs. "Especially you."

  Griffs bristled, but another gesture from Smith kept him quiet. "I'm sure it does," Smith said. "But it doesn't keep you that healthy." His eyes hardened. "You've been getting Idunine, haven't you?"

  That was, of course, the obvious first assumption for them to make. Trouble was, it had the potential to get all of Shelter Valley into nearly as much trouble as the truth would. "What if I have?" Foxleigh growled. "Is that a crime?"

  Smith shrugged. "Depends on how you've been getting it."

  Foxleigh lowered his eyes. "Don't want to get anyone in trouble," he muttered.

  "You won't," Smith assured him.

  Foxleigh knew how much that promise was worth. But he had little choice in the matter. "It was the doc in town," he admitted. "Doc Adamson. He gave me a little once when my leg was acting up so badly I couldn't walk."

  "When was that?"

  "Ten years ago," Foxleigh said grudgingly. "Maybe twelve."

  "Did it work?"

  "Good enough," Foxleigh said, watching the other's face out of the corner of his down-turned eyes. So far he seemed to be buying it. "I still have some trouble, especially in the cold. But at least I can get by."

  "So what other illegal drugs does Doc Adamson have?" Griffs asked.

  "Who says Idunine is illegal?" Foxleigh demanded, glaring up at him. "Used to be you could get it all the time before the war."

  "Before the war," Griffs repeated tersely. "This is after the war, and Idunine is strongly regulated.

  Somehow, I don't see a backwoods witch doctor having legal access to it."

  "Maybe he had some left over from before," Foxleigh said, looking accusingly at Smith. "You said he wouldn't get in trouble."

  "If he was just using up an old supply, he won't," Smith assured him. "But if he's black-marketing it ...

  well, we'll see."

  Foxleigh grimaced. That was, in fact, the story he and Adamson had worked out all those years ago in case someone started asking these very questions. He just hoped the doc hadn't forgotten the details. "So is that it?" he muttered.

  "Just about," Smith said. "You said you did some hunting. That mean you have a gun?"

  "No, I brain the deer with rocks," Foxleigh bit out sarcastically. "Of course I have a gun. It's over there beside the bed."

  "Guns are regulated, too, of course," Smith pointed out as Griffs strode over for a look.

  "Yeah, why am I not surprised?" Foxleigh said with a sniff, watching Griffs closely as he took the old scattergun off the rack. "Careful with it—careful."

  "He is," Smith said soothingly. "Well?"

  "It's within the limits," Griffs said, a note of disappointment in his voice. Clearly, he'd been hoping he could find an excuse to confiscate it. Setting it back into its rack, he pulled up the thin mattress and looked beneath it. "Any other weapons?"

  "Just the knife, and it's mostly for eating with," Foxleigh said. "What are you doing?"

  "I'm looking around," Griffs said, dropping the mattress and running his hands through the books and other odds and ends in the crate that served as a nightstand. "That all right with you?"

  "Not really, no," Foxleigh said, looking back at Smith. "If he wrecks anything, it's coming out of his hide."

  "He'll be careful," Smith said, his voice suddenly a little too casual. "You have any visitors up here recently?"

  Foxleigh felt his stomach tighten. "Not unless the doc's visit way back when counts as recently," he said.

  "Why?"

  "The thermal reading we took from the town a little while ago seemed too high for one man," Smith said. "You have anything you'd like to tell us?"

  "Aside from go to hell?" Foxleigh countered. "This is the cabin. You see anyone else here?"

  "Don't get smart," Griffs warned as he sifted gingerly through the wood bin. "If you're covering for someone, you're going to be in serious trouble."

  Foxleigh snorted. "I stopped covering for anyone forty years ago," he said. "You were probably just reading my stove—you can see for yourself it's still hot. That, or your equipment's no damn good."

  "We'll have it checked out," Smith said. "Griffs?"

  "Seems clean," Griffs said, standing in the middle of the room for one final look. His eyes lingered a moment on the sink and toilet area, and Foxleigh held his breath. But the young Security man turned away without comment and nodded to his partner. "Let's get out of this pig hole."

  "Good-bye, Mr. Toby," Smith said, giving Foxleigh an almost friendly smile as they left.

  Foxleigh watched through the window as the two men picked their way down the path back toward town, his stomach settling into a hard knot. Smith's smile had been almost friendly, all right. But Foxleigh wasn't fooled, any more than Smith had been fooled by his hot-stove story. A good IR sensor could tell the difference between a stove and a human body, and even if the analyzers on their Birren-7 patrol boat weren't good enough to sort that out the ones in Athena certainly were.

  And if he'd been reading Smith's face right, running the track through those analyzers was the first thing he would do when he got back to base.

  Half an hour later, he heard the Birren-7 lift back into the sky ... and with that, the clock was now counting down. Still, he couldn't simply haul the two blackcollars back up. Not yet. Smith might have been suspicious enough to leave an observer or two behind.

  Maybe there was a way to find out about that. Reaching to the top of the window, he pulled down the red shade. Then, crossing over to his larder, he started putting together a traveling pack.

  Adamson must have been watching for the signal. Barely fifteen minutes later, the medic strode through the door. "What happened?" he asked.

  "About what you'd expect," Foxleigh said, sinking down on the end of the bed and gesturing his visitor to the chair. "They came in, looked around, and made veiled threats against whoever'd given me my Idunine. I told them you'd used old stock."

  "Yes, they asked me about that, too," Adamson said. "But they seemed satisfied with my answers. What did you say about the IR readings?"

  "You knew about that?"

  "I heard them discussing it," Adamson said. "That was just before they asked me who lived up here."

  "I tried to blame the stove," Foxleigh said, grimacing. "But I don't think they bought it."

  "I don't think so, either," Adamson agreed with a sigh. "Cracked ribs or not, Jensen and Flynn are both going with me tomorrow."

  "They're going sometime in the next hour, you mean," Foxleigh said with a snort. "That's more the round-trip time to Boulder."

  "Relax," Adamson said, holding out a hand. "They already have their hands full checking on the other pylons."

  Foxleigh frowned. "The pylons? That's all they were here for?"

  "That's it," Adamson said. "And they're hurrying like crazy to get back to base before full night.

  Apparently, they're expecting trouble in Athena."

  Foxleigh took a deep breath. So he had a little more time. Good. "Any idea what kind of trouble?"

  Adamson shrugged. "They weren't talking about it, but my guess is blackcollar trouble." He lifted his eyebrows. "Now for the big question: What are you planning to do with all this?"

  Foxleigh's first impulse was to lie. But Adamson deserved better. "I'm going into the base," he told the other. "Jensen knows the way—he was in once before."

  "You think that's where he and Flynn were headed?"

  "I don't know what else could possibly be out here he would wa
nt," Foxleigh said. "All I have to do is persuade him to take me in with him."

  "How? With the truth?"

  Foxleigh shrugged. "As much of it as he needs."

  "As much as he needs, or as much as you want him to know?"

  "Same difference," Foxleigh said. He smiled tightly. "Hell, doc, even you don't know all the truth."

  "Yeah, I've always sort of figured that," Adamson said ruefully. "You can trust me, you know."

  "I know," Foxleigh said with a sigh. "But there are certain truths that are better left hidden."

  For a moment the two men sat in silence, each wrapped in his own thoughts. For Foxleigh, the thoughts were mingled with bitter memories. But they would soon be over. All of it would soon be over.

  Eventually, Adamson stirred. "So what do you want me to do?"

  "Take Flynn into Denver tomorrow as planned," Foxleigh said. "He needs to find the other blackcollars and let them know what's happening."

  "You sure you and Jensen won't need him?" Adamson asked doubtfully. "That's not an easy hike, and you both qualify for walking-wounded status."

  "We'll make it," Foxleigh said.

  "If you don't, it's an equally long walk back," Adamson warned. "What then?"

  "Then as far as I'm concerned, you're released," Foxleigh said. "Your life is completely your own again."

  Adamson's eyes drifted toward the window and the mountain towering against the sky to the southeast.

  "You're not coming back, are you?" he said quietly.

  Foxleigh shrugged, probably a little too casually. "That depends on what I can talk Jensen into. Hey, I may not even make it over the next ridge." He held out a hand. "But whatever happens, I want you to know how much I appreciate what you've done for me."

  "I haven't done anything but my job," Adamson told him, gripping the other's hand tightly. "Good luck to you."

  "And to you," Foxleigh said, letting go of his hand. "Now go home. Practice being shocked by the horrific revelations Security's going to bring when they come knocking on the door."

  "Shocked I can do in my sleep," Adamson said with a wry smile. "Good-bye ... Sam."

  It was the first time in nearly three decades that he'd been called by his true name. The sound of it rang strangely in his ears. "Good-bye, Doc."